Well, our famous local ad agency, Goodby, Silverstein & Partners at 720 California in the Nob Hill / Chinatown area, has just earned the title of Ad Agency of the Decade from AdWeekMedia’s Best of the 2000s.
(IMO, they had this award in the bag solely due to the tail end of the Budweiser Frog, Lizard and Ferret TV campaign stretching into The Aughts. Ah, memories.)
Congratulations to the hundreds of people at Goodby Silverstein!
Deets after the jump.
Long known as a creative and strategic powerhouse for culture-penetrating TV and print work, Omnicom Group’s Goodby, Silverstein & Partners spent the second half of the ’00s reinventing itself for digital. Early in the decade, its best work included celebrated TV productions like the Super Bowl spots for Budweiser with the lizards and ferrets; E*Trade’s “Dancing Monkey”; the lyrical “Sheet Metal” for Saturn; and whimsical musical numbers for eBay. Mid-decade triumphs included “The computer is personal again” for Hewlett-Packard and the multimedia milk-deprived-aliens work for “Got milk?” After losing Saturn in 2007, the San Francisco shop went on a phenomenal new-business run, adding more than $2 billion in billings within a few short months, including Sprint and Hyundai. All the while, it was transforming itself from ad maker to content provider, producing “art that serves capitalism,” as Jeff Goodby and Rich Silverstein call it, in whatever form that’s required. Goodby was honored as Interactive Agency of the Year at Cannes in 2009 for its breakthrough work for clients like Sprint (“The Now Network”), Doritos (“Hotel 626″) and Nintendo (“Wario Land: Shake It!”). Retooled into a potent force for the digital age, Goodby, Silverstein & Partners is a true master of all trades, deserving to be called the decade’s best. —Eleftheria Parpis
Goodby, Silverstein & Partners Named ‘Agency of the Decade’
AdweekMedia Also Gives Top Honor to Founders Jeff Goodby and Rich Silverstein as ‘Executives of the Decade’ and Selects Agency’s NBA Ad as ‘Print Ad of the Decade’
SAN FRANCISCO, Dec. 14 /PRNewswire/ — Goodby, Silverstein & Partners announced today that it has been named “Agency of the Decade” by AdweekMedia. To mark the end of the decade, the editors at AdweekMedia, which includes Adweek, Brandweek and Mediaweek, selected the marketing, media and agency performances from 2000 to 2009 that most influenced the industry and came to define the era.
“All of us in this business are facing big, truly watershed changes in the world around us. We are so proud of our people and what they’ve taught us, and each other. It’s made all the difference. We’re also thankful for the patience of our clients, and the eye-opening inspiration of so many other agencies. Their tireless urging is what gets us out of bed every morning. We wish they would let up, and then again, we kind of don’t.” — Jeff Goodby, Co-Chairman and Creative Director
As part of the “Best of the 2000s” report, the editors also elected Goodby, Silverstein & Partners founders Jeff Goodby and Rich Silverstein ‘Executives of the Decade,’ the highest honor given by the publication to executives in the industry.
“To me, Jeff and Rich don’t deserve to be called ‘Executives of the Decade.’ Executives usually just sit in paneled offices, smoke cigars and do client lunches. What Jeff and Rich should be called is ‘Leaders of the Decade.’ They are out on the front lines daily, constantly pushing us all to think further and do more. It’s a challenge to keep up with them, but it’s a challenge I wouldn’t trade for anything.” — Harold Sogard, Vice-Chairman
Acknowledging Goodby, Silverstein & Partners’ contribution to the most influential advertising campaigns and creative work of the last ten years, AdweekMedia additionally selected the “There Can Only Be One” campaign for the NBA as its “Print Ad of the Decade.”
“Although Print doesn’t move, make noise, or animate, it better jump off the page, and that’s what I like about our NBA work. We are humbled and honored by the attention.” — Rich Silverstein, Co-Chairman and Creative Director
The widely-celebrated ad, which features a split screen showing half of two players’ faces, proved not only exceptionally popular with basketball fans, but also transcended the sports world to be parodied by Saturday Night Live, ESPN Sports Center, and be involved in the marketing of the Adam Sandler film Zohan. Proving that resonant advertising can permeate popular culture, entertainment and even politics, the image notably inspired the cover artwork of TIME magazine’s April 25, 2008 issue, which featured a split image of presidential candidates Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama.
AdweekMedia has unveiled its choices for “Best of the 2000s” in this week’s issues of Adweek, Brandweek and Mediaweek, which are viewable at adweek.com.
About Goodby, Silverstein & Partners
Goodby, Silverstein & Partners, a unit of the Omnicom Group, is one of the world’s most respected and most awarded advertising agencies. Founded in 1983, the company is based in San Francisco and has over 500 employees serving a broad array of national and international accounts. For more information on GSP, please visit goodbysilverstein.com.
Source: Goodby, Silverstein & Partners
The following are listed in Goodby, Silverstein & Partners self-promotion material as clients of the agency:
- Adobe Systems
- American Century Investments
- California Milk Processing Board
- Cheetos
- Comcast
- Commonwealth Bank of Australia
- Denny’s
- Doritos
- Dreyer’s
- Elizabeth Arden
- Emerald Nuts
- Foster Farms
- General Electric – Ecomagination
- Häagen-Dazs
- Hewlett-Packard
- Kayak.com
- NBA
- Netflix
- Propel
- Pizza Hut (former)
- Quaker
- Specialized Bicycles
- Sprint
- Team US F1
- Tostitos
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