Comments to Luke Sullivan's "Hey Whipple" Blog

Comments to Luke Sullivan's "Hey Whipple" Blog where he ran what he said were the best Radio Ads done for Phillips. It was for an old technology, and I thought ironic how that technology was perceived at the time -- then recounting my similar experience with work done for 3M.

Dear Luke,

Reminds me of when 3M hired me to merchandise their Blank Video Cassettes and VCR Head Cleaners. We created Free Standing Display Shippers — 200 or 300 hundred per display that touted “3M Quality at a Ridiculous Price.”

I thought we had won our way into this large 3M business unit only to find out that we were dumping an inventory on an unsuspecting public with a technology that was about to be phased-out. When they sold out the inventory and sold then technology and production equipment to a Japanese company, I never heard from them again — their CVD and DVD business went to somebody else. Apparently, “3M Quality at a Ridiculous Price,” didn’t merit a pitch for the new business, no matter how successful the previous effort was for them.

Another 3M story is when a Marketing Manager for Leisure Products asked me if I knew how to Fly Fish. I told her yes, my Grandfather had taught me using silk line to float, and silk line weighted down with White Petroleum Jelly to sink — but I haven’t done it in years. She told me how the unit President was an avid fly fisherman and that I’d best have current experience to relate to him before I presented to him. So I went out and purchased the 3M Fly Fishing Reels and several types of 3M lines. I then went on a 2 week fishing trip in Northern Minnesota catching my limit of every kind of fish every day, using the 3M system. Coming back I called the Marketing Manager again and again, with her never returning my calls. Finally I had our production team produce a photo journal of Daryl Orris’ Fly Fishing Adventure, touting the 3M system. I was all decked out in Fly Fishing garb, highlighting the 3M equipment and the beautiful Northern Minnesota Lake scenery.

When her call came it was to tell me that the campaign idea of showing individual Fly Fisherman’s experience with the 3M Fly Fishing Systems, demonstrating its unique features and resulting fishing successes was an interesting concept, but they decided to go in another direction.

I never did see anything that was ever produced for the products — telling my people that she doesn’t have to, she is selling enough product to Admen trying to get their business that a campaign is really unnecessary.

Postscript: I still go fly fishing each summer. I even fly fished in the rivers and streams of China, catching all sorts of weird looking creatures, including ones with fur. When I Fly Fish it is a sort of Zen Meditation thing for me, I am forever in her debt - it has become my favorite sport. When whacked out with real world problems I chill by thinking of fly fishing.