What Would Jackie Do?

The 1960s among other things, was also a time of great admiration for the first lady, Jackie Kennedy. Her impeccable tastes in fashion were admired by women around the country. Designer Oleg Cassini decided her wardrobe for the 1961 inauguration. Jackie was quoted saying that she wanted to dress as if "Jack were president of France" and the couple lived up to this iconic fashion level. Jackie beamed with elegance, regality, and sophistication, and the American people adored her. She was known for her classic black and white combinations (black on top, white on bottom), very large sunglasses and the famous accidentally dented pill box hat which was inspiration for many designers to create pill box hats with an intentional dent. Her look was classic then and is timeless now. For a guide to What Would Jackie Do? consult the book by Shelly Branch and Sue Callaway!

Sexism in Advertising

It is no secret that the 1960's gender gap was a large, gaping hole. Men worked in offices in positions of authority. They made decisions and they made money. And while women did work in offices, such as the ones on Mad Men, most of them were accessories to the men; answerig their phone calls, taking their messages, and not given the authority to make decisions. Advertising did nothing to ill in this gap. In commercials, women were in a kitchen more than half of the time and almost always in the home. Food advertisments were directed towards women, convincing them that it is important to buy what is best for their family as that was their duty. Men in advertisements were often in sports, near cars, or relaxing in their homes. Men were the mediators and the voice of reason, often for the females in these advertisements. In commercials for things such as beauty products, men had the voice overs, convincing the women that they know what's best. Blatantly stated, advertising was completely sexist.

Examples include Barbie Dolls, who often portrayed women as a stylish, beautiful figure and only that to young girls; Ford, who rarely had women in their commercials and were always voiced over by men; and Tide laundry detergent, one particular commercial in which is woman is depicted as joyous as can be folding laundry by the seaside with a man's voice praising the detergent and the woman for using it.

1960-1969

The 1960s was a time of radical revolution. Movements were made across America promoting civil rights, women's rights, and equality for all. Music was influenced by and influenced the time. In 1960, the youngest president was elected.

.

Folk music, inspired by the changing times, was at its height. In 1961, the father of folk began to strum his guitar and vocalize his lyrics throughout Greenwich Village.

A year later, Hollywood's icon overdosed. A year after that, in the summer of 1963, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. delivered his "I Have a Dream Speech" in Washington, D.C. Three months later, JFK was shot and killed.

Beatlemania had already spread when, in 1964, The Beatles performed on the Ed Sullivan Show. Two months later, twelve of their records were at the top of the charts.

Anti-Vietnam War protests escalated as America's involvement in the war expanded. Riots spread across the country in protest of U.S. involvement.

More music began to immigrate from the UK to the US. Popularity of The Rolling Stones soared in 1967 when they performed on the Ed Sullivan Show. Music continued to play a major role in the decade throughout its movements and revolts.

Youth culture was the dominant force behind the 1960s. Hippies from the Village in New York to Berkeley and San Francisco in California continued to cry for love and peace as the war continued on. An anti-war riot broke out at Columbia University in 1968, calling for an end to the conflict in Vietnam.

The decade's final year came to a close with the marriage of John and Yoko, the Stonewall Riots in New York, the release of To Kill a Mockingbird, and, of course, the most famous, biggest music festival to date: Woodstock.

Andy Warhol

Andy Warhol is best known for creating are using the image of the Campbell's Soup can. Born in Pittsburgh in 1928, Warhol spent his career as an artist working with pop art, a more modern genre that fit in with the sort of stuff coming into the United States through the British Invasion. The image of a Campbell's Soup can was transformed from mundane to eye-catching. The idea was a sort of commentary on the mass production of the 60's. Warhol also created pop art with the image of himself and celebrities such as Mick Jagger, Marilyn Monroe, and Jackie Kennedy. A quote from American Visions by Robert Hughes sums Warhol up perfectly: "...in a culture glutted with information, when most people experience most things at second or third hand through TV and print, through images that become banal and disassociated by repeated again and again and again, there is role for affectless art. You no longer need to be hot and full of feeling. You can be supercool, like a slightly frosted mirror. Not that Warhol worked this out; he didn't have to. He felt it and embodied it. He was a conduit for a sort of collective American state of mind in which celebrity- the famous image of a person, the famous brand name- had completely replaced both sacredness and solidity."

Changes from Counterculture to Culture

Booze Ads

Car Ads

Endorsing Free Spirit

Endorsing Hip Visual Style

Slogans

For the Sophisticated Viewer

The Revolution of the 60's

The 1950's and the early 1960's had a growing sense of counterculture. The general norms were completely different from the activities of the commercial world. The two sides clashed in thought. The counterculture believed in nature, simplicity and drugs in search of an authentic experience, which was different from the prevailing culture . The counterculture was against the idea of "mass society" which was being promoted the most.

The commercial world of advertising had a working way that was completely different from the counterculture. They believed in giving the consumer what they wanted. They just worked towards satisfying the wants of consumers. The "Theory X" was what it was called where they just worked to satisfy every "whim" of their consumers. This "Theory X" encouraged them to chose a path that had values of "science, efficiency and management" to deal with this and to solve their problems. the only thing that was focussed upon was how they could sell their products rather than being "creative" in marketing them. These ads were 'shielded from real life,' making no effort to 'engage their readers on a direct basis or attempt to involve them.'" The target for these ads was just plainly persuasive and not psychologically effective, giving a reason for the consumers to buy something.

In contrast, the counterculture did not encourage this and they believed in "creativity and carnival." The scientific effect did not appeal to the counterculture to a great extent. They wanted to engage the audience with the products. They wanted to make every product seem like an individual identity, creating brands, creating brand images, etc. Their belief was that advertising had to be creative and individualistic to sell.

The new generation of advertisers in the 1960's were now coming up with authentic, artistic and sophisticated ideas. The old monotonous, repetitiveness was fading away and the advertisements were now becoming more hip. The hierarchal and "slow moving" Madison Avenue was now conveying messages of being more hip than following the standard consumerism. The idea of mass society was looked down on now. The sixties were turning to the counterculture and making it the prevailing culture. A sense of individuality was now prevailing in the advertising industry.

Bringing Back History

An article in the New York Times in 2008 said that Mad Men is having a lot of influence on the advertising today. The advertising agencies today take pride in this show since it depicts to the audience today about what the working of an agency is all about.

Many efforts are being made my a number of companies to connect themselves with the show. For instance, Zippo decided to sponsor the new DVD box-set of the show such that the box would be in the shape of a Zippo to signify the importance of smoking in that period.

Michael Kors also decided to give off the DVD sets of the show with every $350 spent on his Fall 2008 line of clothing. Marketers today are glad that this how helps them show the world their work. Also the show helps them in the working since they can actually see what the gains and loses of success are in the long run.

Issues relating to gender, race and religion are also being looked upon. The development america has gone through since that time is also highlighted through the show.

The show is having a great impact on society today and people are becoming well informed about the past through the show.

This clorox ad is a great example!

Today's 'Mad Men'

Don Draper of AMC's original series 'Mad Men'

Vogue, Sony, and Cigarettes

1960s Cigarette Ads

Confessions of An Advertising Man- David Ogilvy

Though we can research till we're blue in the face, no other source of information is as telling as a book written in the time period by one of the leading ad men of the time, David Ogilvy. Ogilvy was partner in the firm Ogilvy & Mather, an advertising agency that still exists today. Though the book primarily is informative for the wanna-be ad executives of the sixties, today it serves as a commentary on how and why the advertising industry targeted the audiences it did. It was an ad man's job to see the trends in the tumultuous sixties and predict where society was headed. Getting inside Ogilvy's head is like getting inside the 1960's grocery store, television, and newspaper.

Some of my favorite lines I pulled from the text below:

"The two most powerful words you can use in a headline are FREE and NEW. You can seldom use FREE but you can almost always use NEW- if you try hard enough"

(from "How to Write Potent Copy")

"(7) Give a recipe whenever you can. The housewife is always on the lookout for new ways to please her family."

"(16) Be serious. Don't use humor or fantasy. Don't be clever in your headline. Feeding her family is a serious business for most housewives."

( both from "How to Make Good Campaigns for Food Products, Tourist Destinations, and Proprietary Medicines")

1960s Timeline

1960	Joan Baez and Pete Seeger play at the Newport Folk Festival (May). John Kennedy and Richard Nixon engage in the first of their televised presidential debates (September 26).
1961	Bob Dylan begins to perform in Greenwich Village clubs (January). Poet Robert Frost recites his poem “The Gift Outright” at the Kennedy Inaugural (January 20). Ernest Hemingway kills himself with a shotgun in his Ketchum, Idaho, home (July 2).
1962	John Glenn becomes the first American to orbit Earth (February 20). Actress Marilyn Monroe dies after apparently taking a drug overdose (July 22). Federal legislation is approved declaring LSD a hallucinogenic drug that must be regulated by law (October).
1963	Julia Child demonstrates on television how to prepare bæuf bourguignon, beginning a series of cooking lessons on educational television stations (February 11). Sylvia Plath, author of The Bell Jar, commits suicide (February 11). Little Stevie Wonder becomes the first performer simultaneously to top the American pop singles, pop albums, and rhythm and blues singles charts (August 24). Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., delivers his “I Have a Dream” speech at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, DC (August 28). Millions of people remain in front of their television sets by the hour to watch events relating to the death and funeral of President John F. Kennedy, with regular programming returning on November 26 (November 22–25).
1964	The Beatles perform on The Ed Sullivan Show (February 9). Twelve Beatles records are on the top one hundred list (April). Students initiate the Free Speech Movement at the University of California, Berkeley (October). ABC, CBS, and NBC simultaneously broadcast in color for the first time (December 20).
1965	A teach-in to oppose the Vietnam War occurs at the University of Michigan, beginning a new antiwar tactic (March 2). Bob Dylan switches to an electric guitar at the Newport Folk Festival and is roundly booed (July 25). Vatican II ends in Rome; church officials later issue new guidelines that modernize Catholic ritual and church architecture (December 5).
196	From this date forward cigarette packages contain a warning that “Cigarette smoking may be hazardous to your health” (January 1). Simon and Garfunkel’s “The Sounds of Silence” is Number One in Billboard for the week of January 1 (January 1). Betty Friedan and other advocates for women’s rights create the National Organization for Women (NOW) (October 29).
1967	The Rolling Stones perform the song “Let’s Spend the Night Together” onThe Ed Sullivan Show (January). The Green Bay Packers defeat the Kansas City Chiefs 35–21 in the first Super Bowl (January 15). The Monterey International Pop Festival occurs in Monterey, California, beginning the Summer of Love (June 16–18). William Styron’s The Confessions of Nat Turner is published by Random House and engenders controversy over its depiction of Turner (September 9).
1968	Abbie Hoffman and Jerry Rubin found the Youth International Party, a radical group better known as the Yippies (January 16). Students for a Democratic Society (SDS) members occupy buildings at Columbia University to protest the Vietnam War (April). The science-fiction film 2001: A Space Odyssey opens in New York City (April 3). Tom Wolfe’s The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test appears from Farrar, Straus and Giroux, describing the 1964 LSD trip across the country by Ken Kesey and his Merry Pranksters (August 19).
1969	The first commercial Boeing 747 flight lands successfully (February 8). The Doors’ Jim Morrison is arrested and charged with obscene actions while performing in Miami (March 1). Beatle John Lennon and Yoko Ono marry (March 20). Police raid the Stonewall Inn, a gay bar in Greenwich Village, precipitating the “Stonewall Riots” and the beginning of the gay liberation movement (June 27). Harper Lee’s novel of southern racism, To Kill a Mockingbird, is published (July 11). Neil Armstrong walks on the moon (July 20). Members of Charles Manson’s “family” commit multiple murders, including the murder of actress Sharon Tate (August 9). Almost one-half million people watch many of the country’s most famous singers and musicians perform at Woodstock, New York (August 15–17). Jack Kerouac, author of On the Road, dies of alcoholism (October 21).

The 1960s: Advertising

The 1960s was the age for advertising. The social and technological changes of the decade created an era of consumerism. It was a decade of youth, and the turmoil of the political, moral and sexual revolutions that took place called for advertisers to build their strategies around these new ideologies.

A major philosophical shift took place in advertising at the beginning of the 1960s, as well. The traditional approaches taken by ad agencies began to change prior to 1960, embarking on an advertising and agency-wide creative revolution.

Mad Men

The AMC Original, Mad Men is a great source for real insight into the 1960s advertising world. The men were hungry for success, entertainment, and pleasure and weren't afraid to stay in the office for all three. This particular clip (address below) from the modern TV show gives real insight into the part of the advertising world that is often overlooked but was definitely depended on-- the ad executive's "girl" or secretary. The "girl" juggled responsibilities that secretaries today would not dream of being responsible for. Some submitted to their positions as inferiors to the men easier than others. Women like the character Joan Holloway, however, had more power than they let their bosses onto.

"Mad Men - Joan gives Peggy the 411"

We're all "mad" here...

Advertising in the 1960's revolved around politics, culture, and technology. But that was the 60's: a time of protest, of free-thinking, the British Invasion, and movements for the rights of Americans. The advertising world revolved around what was going on in America and the demands of it's citizens.

New York City was the golden place of advertising. Agencies successful during the decade included McCann-Erickson; J. Walter Thompson; Batten, Burton, Durstine, and Osborne; Young and Rubican; Leo Burnett; Ogilvy and Mather; and Doyle Dane Bernbach.

In Advertising in the 60's: Turncoats, Traitionalists, and Waste Makers in America's Turbulent Decade by Hazel G. Warlaumont, she includes a chronological chart with popular brands that appeared during the decade:
1960 Domino's Pizza delivers hot, fresh pies in Ann Arbor, Michigan.
1960 Etch A Sketch magnetic screen makes artists out of children and adults.
1962 Royal Crown Diet Cola is the first nationally marketed low-calorie soft drink, quickly followed by Coca Cola's Tab and Pepsi's Patio Cola.
1963 The Corvette Sting Ray is one of the hottest cars on the road.
1963 Weight Watcher's is founded by Jean Nidetch to help people take off pounds sensibly.
1964 Gatorade sports drink first appears on the sidelines at University of Florida Gators' football games.
1964 The Ford Mustang is introduced as a sporty, stylish car priced at just $2,368.
1968 The Big Mac appears on McDonald's fast food menu, featuring "two all beef patties special sauce lettuce cheese pickles onions on a sesame seed bun."

There was also legislation that affected advertising at the time, including the 1963 Equal Pay Act which stated that men and women in the same job should be paid equally, the 1965 Highway Beautification Act which prohibited commercial signs within 660 feet of federally funded highways, and the 1968 Equal Oppurtunity Opportunity Commision which factored in race to job employment.

Advertisements

Mad Ave

1960

Madison Avenue. 1960.