"I don't care if you are fucking Superman..."

A nice little story to ease my friends in the advertising business, into the weekend.

An extract from Dave Trott’s outstanding book Predatory Thinking.

" Y&R is in the big building at Mornington Crescent, in North London. But there's another agency in that building too. It's an American agency called Wunderman

Apparently, one day the owner flew in to visit his agency. He was a big, brash New Yorker. 

He drove straight into the car park below the building. The gruff cockney parking attendant stopped him. 

He said, 'Where you going, guv?' 

The American was indignant. 

He said, 'I'm parking, of course.' 

The parking attendant said, 'You gotta permit?' 

The American said ,'No.' 

The parking attendant said, 'Then you ain't parking here.' 

The American was outraged. He said, 'Do you know who I am?'

The parking attendant shook his head and said, 'No.'

The American got out of his car, raised himself to his full height, tapped his chest and said, 'I'm Wunderman.'

The parking attendant said, "I don't care if you are fucking Superman. You ain't parking here.'

I love that story.

I love what it tells us about ourselves.

Our whole world is advertising, so we think everyone's world is advertising.

That's why so many of us are bad at it.

We don't think it's our job to talk to people outside advertising.

We think it's their job to pay attention to ourselves.

So, we're not talking to people, we're taking to ourselves."