AdamWohl.com

MIR, Year One.

A year.  Wow.  Can’t believe it’s been that long.  Things have moved along so fast in the last twelve months that it’s a bit hard to remember everything that has transpired, and as I do, it’s even harder to encapsulate it all in just one post.  And in what format?  A chronological history, from day one to today?  A detailed account of the strategy behind every step, every choice, every move we’ve made along the way?  It’s a toss-up. I’m going hybrid.  So, hopefully without giving away any trade secrets or boring anyone to sleep, here’s the story of MIR, so far…

Darrell and I met in the early spring of ’09.  On twitter.  Yep, twitter.  (Hey, we practice what we preach).  In California at the time, I was tweeting comebacks and jokes, and getting chummy with some high-level ad people.  Darrell read something I tweeted and hit me up because he needed a writer.  And believe me - holy shit - I needed an art director.  Despite different disciplines, we had a lot in common.  We weren’t long-time admen; my experience was writing TV and movies.  Darrell worked in the music and apparel industries prior to advertising. But we both grew up around advertising, with deep family roots in the ad business.  More importantly, we had complimentary philosophies and a similar work ethic, specifically, we didn’t like talking about doing things.  We just liked to do them. 

So we agreed we’d free-lance on something together.  That project went really well.  So we did another.  Ditto.  Then, when we went to do a third, we got turned away.  “No free-lancers.”  The agency wanted to work with vendors.  So, a visit to GoDaddy.com and ten bucks later, MIR was born.  A strategist friend of ours, Conrad Lisco gave us some work on Sprite and Microsoft.  And we nailed it.  And then the phone started ringing.  And ringing.  We needed more people.  And slowly we grew, adhering to David Ogilvy’s belief of surrounding yourself with giants. Chad Leddy came on as producer, and Daniel Lammon as a strategist.  A meeting with an agency on a global account brought me back to New York City, place of my birth and where I’d always wanted to live as an adult.  Even with the expansion, MIR was lean and mean, building a reputation of doing quality, cutting edge work quickly, from analysis to strategy to creativity to full in-house development and execution.  So we kept getting work.  And now, twelve months later, we’ve worked with every holding company, many of the best agency networks and independents in the world and on behalf of incredible brands, including four of the top ten in US ad spend, who spent over eight billion dollars in the last year.

Sure, there have been difficulties with agencies, and running a company is not always sunshine and smiles; the stress can be very high.  But I wouldn’t trade this last year for anything.  The friends I’ve made are far too numerous to count.  If I were to make a list, I’m sure I’ll forget someone, which would be hard for me to live with.  But I trust you all know who you are and know how much I appreciate your support, trust and friendship.

That’s really the derivation. MIR was a creative entity born out of a little frustration and probably more than a little desperation.  I’d bet a lot of great things were fostered under similar circumstances.

So what about the MIR philosophies? I get asked about these a lot.

Like most things (in my opinion), they’re simple:

• We care about doing great work and take on clients that expect that level of work from us and deliver their share of the same. 

• We reserve the right to say no.

• We stand up and push back for what we think is best for the brand and campaign.

• We hire people who are smart, creative and charismatic, regardless of the position.

• We hire people we’d hang with out of the office, what I call “The TV staff writer test”:  I don’t care how good your spec scripts are, if the show producers don’t want to hang out with you for 14 or more hours a day, you’ll never get hired on staff.  Never. 

• We believe digital and related emerging medias are the only remaining consistent form of advertising that are truly global and that all other channels should revolve around and support them.  

• We think mobile is the future, and that people should “unlearn” the belief that mobile=cellular phone.  What two of every three people on this planet own and have within two feet of them as you read this is a mobile computer that happens to feature a phone.  It is a delivery system of messages, entertainment, education and utility.  All of which can be provided and/or sponsored by brands.

• In The Godfather, Michael Corleone said, “It’s not personal; it’s strictly business.”  As it pertains to social media, we disagree.  We believe “Business is personal.”  Brands who embrace this will succeed.  Those who don’t will end up like Santino at the Toll Booths.

• We still don’t like to talk about doing the work, we like to do it.