- Albert Lasker - Advertising Hall of Fame
Jeffery L. Cruikshank and Arthur W. Schultz credit Albert D. Lasker with “the creation of the advertising century,” an awesome achievement by anyone’s standards. They are referring to the 20th Century, which jump-started copywriting, broadcasting, political advertising and product branding to new levels of sophistication and effectiveness.
Lasker’s achievements were earlier chronicled by the Advertising Hall of Fame and John Gunther’s “Taken at the Flood.” But Cruikshank and Schultz draw on “a recently uncovered trove of Lasker’s papers” to document even more of his career and character in their new book, “The Man Who Sold America: the Amazing (But True!) Story of Albert D. Lasker and the Creation of the Advertising Century,” (Harvard Business Review Press, 400 pages, $27.95.)
Lasker helped build Lord & Thomas into one of America’s biggest advertising agencies in the first half of the 20th Century. L&T represented clients such as Lucky Strike, Quaker Oats, Goodyear, Colgate-Palmolive and Pepsodent.
After he sold the agency to Emerson Foote, Fairfax Cone and Don Belding, the new owners changed the name to Foote, Cone and Belding. FCB later merged with Draft to form the current Draftfcb agency.
Lasker Contributions
Cruikshank and Schultz point out that in the process of building Lord & Thomas, Lasker made even greater contributions to the ad industry. He is credited with pioneering or enhancing:
- Agency copywriting, changing it from a client function to an agency responsibility. Agencies previously focused on brokering media ad space.
- A “reason why” copywriting strategy that revolutionized the industry
- Mail-order advertising
- Research to test the effectiveness of advertising.
In pursuing his "reason why" strategy, Lasker promoted Lucky Strike cigarettes as a way to lose weight. As Richard Edelman also points out, Lasker created Professor Anderson to sell Quaker Puffed Rice Cereal and used nurses to sell Kotex.
The Hall of Fame tribute to Laskersays he "helped to make copywriting a central function of the advertising agency. He helped to shift the focus of advertising campaigns from wholesalers and retailers to the consumers themselves."
Gunther was even more lavish in his praise. He wrote that Lasker "was responsible for almost every new development that came to advertising for 25 years."
Consultant to President Warren Harding
Lasker also helped elect Warren Harding as president of the United States and then served as a consultant to him in the White House.
Cruikshank and Schultz also write of Lasker’s other achievements and diverse personality traits, including his drinking, a nervous breakdown and disdain for advertising. Blogger Jeff Covert says their book is a “ brutally honest and turmoil-filled story of a man who had no interest of getting involved in the very industry he made millions in,” which makes it an interesting addition to the history of advertising.
References:
- Richard Edelman, 'The Man Who Sold America," www.edelman.com
- John Gunther: “Taken at the Flood"
