September 2, 2011 • 11:33 am • POSTED BY brendan quinn
This past spring, the fine folks at the Mercedes-Benz AMG Driving Academy were gracious enough to send some of our team to experience a day at the race track, where we got to drive 500-plus horsepower cars around the famed Road Atlanta track, while professional race car drivers taught us how to drive like stuntmen, stuntwomen and, in Justin LaFontaine’s case, StuntCanadians.
All we had to do was capture the essence of this insanely awesome experience, which resulted in the work you can view here.
At the risk of humble bragging here (or is it old fashioned bragging?), this was the easily the greatest day of work any of us had ever had. The kicker? Our hotel was the site of the third most famous event in human history, the place where Grape Stomp Lady punctured her esophagus:
Unable to resist, our crew of highly trained thespians created the following re-enactment:
Once we arrived at the track, we got much, much, more serious about approaching these finely tuned, hand-built German marvels of engineering. Our automotive muse for this excursion could only be one person.
Compare! Steve McQueen: A ruggedly handsome, danger-tempting iconoclast who was irresistible to women and a swashbuckling bon vivant that men aspired to be.
Contrast! Justin LaFontaine: Everything McQueen is, but with a better understanding of kerning.
Our squad of Justin and (from left to right) Kyle Arango, Corey Levin, myself, and Megan Pomplas were ready. Well, most of us were ready; Kyle was equally intent on making his Facebook friends jealous of his jet-setting lifestyle.
Our fleet of vehicles:
Oh wait, that last one is the shitbox that I drive every day.
After a few minutes of instruction, some quality pastries and strong coffee, we hit the road. Kyle and I were partnered up, and we got behind the wheel of the SLS AMG, the gullwinged super car that costs upwards of $200K and has 563 horses sitting under its meticulously sculpted hood. Kyle and I had not been this excited since Bacon Salt was invented. What followed was inspiration for a headline.
Anatomy of a Headline:
Now, we thought we had an understanding of what these cars were, and what driving fast was like, but then you step behind the wheel and are instructed to hit the gas as hard as you can. Within nanoseconds, your heart gets pinned to the back of the leather bucket seat, your head kicks back from the G Forces, and an uncontrollable smile hits your face and laughter takes over. In fact, here’s a ghetto video I took of Kyle’s first run with the SLS (I get too excited and curse in it, so beware):
The resulting headline and spread:
There’s a whole lot of work over at our main site that I’d encourage you to check out. It aims to capture the essence of fun and excitement from the event, where normal folks get to channel their inner Steve McQueen and become as giddy as children on a sugar rush. We hope you enjoy it, cause we sure had a blast making it.
And we can’t thank the people at Mercedes enough for the experience. They were generous and unbelievably accommodating during the trip, and they’ve been a pleasure to work with through our relationship. And with clients like that, you always go the extra mile (per hour?) for them.
September 1, 2011 • 11:30 pm • POSTED BY Tammo Walter
“From the CEO to the stock boy, everyone who picks up a stick at Maverik Lacrosse has actually picked up a stick. Every piece of gear we build starts with 28 NCAA All-American, 10 NCAA Championships, 21 MLL All-Stars, 7 Team USA Players, 10 MLL Championships and 3 All-World Players-–and those are just the guys who work here. We’ve played the sport to the highest level. And now we create the gear to help all players do the same.”
This paragraph of copy we wrote for the 2012 Maverik Lacrosse product catalog goes to the core of what the brand is and what it offers. Maverik knows the sport like no other brand in the mix. Being dissatisfied with the quality and performance of lacrosse equipment, professional players John Gagliardi and Jay Jalbert decided back in 2005 to develop gear themselves that would provide players of all levels with a competitive advantage based on the insight they’d bring to the product development. With the help of other professional players that joined the expanding company they have since then grown into a multi-million dollar operation but amongst their main competitors Maverik is still the underdog brand. However being used to fight for success they are determined to do exactly that and become the #1 brand in the world of lacrosse. And that’s where 160/90 comes into play.
When we met with Maverik for the first time early on this year they were ready to take their brand to the next level and asked us if we’d be interested in helping them get there. They realized that knowing the game and making top-notch lacrosse gear only gets them so far if consumers have no clear picture of who Maverik Lacrosse is and what it is that makes their products better than the others. In many more meetings with key stakeholders, discovery trips to stores, watching games, talking to players and the sales force, trying out gear, studying the competitive landscape, looking through websites, blogs and reading lacrosse magazines we started to understand what’s going on in a world of its own.
Lacrosse is a badass sport and there is a reason why the Cherokees referred to it as “The little brother of war”. Back in the early 15” century injuries and even deaths were common during matches played by the indigenous tribes in North East America. While then each team could easily consist of about 100 to 1,000 men on a field that stretched from about 500 yards to a couple of miles long the game has evolved into a high power battle between 10 players on each side contained within 110 by 60 yards. Now Maverik makes the high-tech gear that not only prevents deaths on the field but lets the game be even more aggressive, powerful and faster than it already was.
With all the intelligence we gathered throughout the discovery and beyond our job became pretty clear, we had to develop a brand that combines the aggressiveness and power of the game with the unique insight and perspective Maverik works into their equipment, ultimately conveying to the consumer why Maverik gear helps elevate their own game. Now back to the first paragraph.
I’m proud that I remember a time when McDonald’s advertising was this Sid-and-Marty Krofft trippy. Via Time:
Also: I’d like to shake hands with the copywriter who named the Lone Jogger. I hope they reveal in the final season of Mad Men that it was Don Draper’s last hurrah.
It’s been a crazy summer at 160over90. There’s been miles of travel (what’s up Los Angeles, London, South Bend), plenty of fun, and a lot of great work, thinking, and collaboration. But before we leave the dog days of summer behind (it’s been one of the hottest Philadelphia summers on record) we wanted to share some of our most recent client work.
We’ve added 11 new clients to our site and over the next few weeks The Boomerang Table will feature a behind-the-scenes view into the work of each. Get your phones, iPads, and computers ready and let us know what you think.
It’s over half-way through August. Not exactly sure how it happened, but it did. Summer is coming to a close and so is 160over90′s “Summer Internship Extravaganza!” (or whatever the official title is).
Way back in May, Mr. James Snyder and myself wandered into 160over90 as the creative interns for the summer. We were like toddlers lost in the grocery store, crying for our mothers and occasionally wetting our pants. Safe to say it made our receptionist uncomfortable.
Three months later, much as changed. “Accidents” are few and far between, we’ve learned that there is no crying in branding, and James moved from humble intern to humble junior designer. Those who know him will tell you, James is a very humble guy.
As for me? I will say that I couldn’t have imagined what was coming my way over the next three months when I first walked through the doors of 160over90. I didn’t really have any expectations coming in, but even if I had, they would have been far exceeded. To put it in words without getting all sentimental and whatnot, I’ve learned so much in my summer at 160. As if just being around the staff here wasn’t enough, I was given the opportunity to get my hands dirty, do some real work, and get loads of valuable experience. It’s been incredible.
The knowledge and relationships I’m going to take away from these short few months promise to be invaluable and I’m extremely grateful for it.
As a side note, apart from doing work for the company, I was also working on a weekly visual journal under the watchful eye of Senior Designer, Dan Blackman. It’s pictured below and can be seen in detail over at my website.
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The position requires a highly motivated individual who can provide support for the production team utilizing InDesign, Photoshop, Illustrator, and by sometimes sending an email or two. Yes, strong graphic design and typography skills are required. The right candidate will be personable, enthusiastic, work well in a team environment, and be ready to switch gears at any moment. You’ll be creating print ready documents, layouts, comps, managing assets/archiving, scanning and typesetting. Working alongside designers will teach you about the creation of brand concepts, while leaving your Facebook page open will teach you about the basics of public relations.
Sound fun? Check out our jobs page over here, and send us an application.
