Cutters’ Flavor design division expanded again to 12 with the addition of Flame artist Christopher Elliott, who moved after a 16-month stint at Utopic and a decade at Red Car Chicago, with the title of director of finishing at both.
Flavor has a staff of 12 with Elliott, its third Flame compositor and finishing artist, working alongside Elliott is Flavor’s third Flame composite and finishing artist, working alongside motion graphic and 3D artists.
Audiences attending the international Agritechnica Exhibition of agricultural equipment recently in Hanover, Germany, watched a dazzling introduction of an updated John Deere flagship tractor through a breakthrough immersive experience created by Alan Hughes’ Next/Now, an award-winning experiential agency.
AGENCY SCC starts 2014 with new business from Evanston-based Kerrygold USA, importers of Ireland-made butter and cheese. Said Molly O’Loughlin, Kerrygold USA’s marketing director, in announcing their new agency: “SCC is a food expert that knows our consumers and most importantly, they are scrappy enough to help us grow our business in any kind of market.”
AFTER THREE YEARS with Shirley Hamilton Talent as a TV and film agent, Sanaa Sayyed joined Claire Simon Casting as a casting assistant – where she first worked as an intern practically off the plane from Houston.
Casting was always her first love, she says, and right now there’s no place busier than Simon, which is casting for TV series “Chicago Fire,” “Chicago PD,” “Betrayal,” “Crisis” and sci-fi feature “Jupiter Ascending.”
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Sandro, the esteemed still photographer who turned his talents to directing commercials last year, has joined Seed Media Arts, the hybrid production-ideation-consulting company of Chicago’s veteran sales rep and executive producer Roy Skillicorn
Red Car Chicago is revving up with a new philosophy, fresh new talent and a determination to revive and elevate the Red Car brand to rank among the top three editorial boutiques in Chicago, says managing director Carrie Holecek.
Towards that end, Red Car hired editors Keith Kristinat from Utopic and Texas native David Rosenblatt, a freelance long-form and feature editor, along with three young men in their first jobs as assistant editors.
Nowadays, with the healthy food police constantly causing a ruckus about anything that smacks of unhealthy eating, it’s gotta be tough for KFC.
Sure, the fried chicken chain supposedly has a healthier version of KFC still out there in the marketplace. But one doesn’t hear a lot about it these days.
So how’s he doing? As Peter McGuinness rapidly approaches his first year anniversary on the job as CEO and president of DDB/Chicago, he at least has managed to now to bring some semblance of stability to an agency that was — for much of the past decade — in danger of imploding.
The shop is not fully righted yet, to be sure. But things are better. There’s no denying Anheuser-Busch, long a lucrative, flagship account at DDB/Chicago, officially left the fold on McGuinness’s watch. But for all intents and purposes, it was already gone before his arrival.
Odd Machine’s L.A. office was in the driver’s seat for the production of a series of 12 commercial-length videos that captured the action of Fiat’s highly anticipated classic new vehicle, the Fiat 500 Abarth, for showcasing on Fiat’s website.
THE COMMERCIALS DAM has burst and this last quarter of 2011 should be busy and profitable for the commercial production/post scene. Directors’ reps are swamped fielding agency bids for major advertisers and out-of-town production companies in abundance have been and currently are shooting here.
Says Valerie Gobos, one of the estimated 40 directors/production company reps: “After a comparatively slow third quarter, the anticipated fourth quarter storyboard flow started out slowly, as agencies went through the creative approval process and exploded this week.”
A major moment of reckoning is coming for Chicago’s very own tech darling (at least for now). Yes, we refer to Groupon, the online discount coupon company founded by former Northwestern University music student Andrew Mason.
Groupon is about to go public with its first stock offering on Nov. 4.
That IPO is happening, however, as serious questions about the discount coupon company and its long-term viability loom larger with each passing day.
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A MAJOR AGENCY CHANGE is at hand as Bob Winter will join Y&R as chief creative officer of the Chicago office, starting in December. He moves over from Leo Burnett where he was SVP/ECD for more than three years on Altoids, Kellogg’s, Greenpeace and Caesars Palace.
Winter succeeds Ken Erke whose departure shocked Michigan Avenue when he joined digital agency R/GA a few months ago as executive creative director. Erke joined Y&R in2000 from Cramer/Krasselt.
Chicago Recording Company created Freelancerinc.com “to address the interests and needs of the new society of freelance professionals,” says CRC VP Michael Gullickson, who manages the site.
He also poses questions to freelance agency producers, like A-list Bob Jackson, who has 20-plus years experience as executive producer working on award-winning accounts at DDB and FCB.
Here’s Jackson’s take on the freelance advertising world he travels.
MG: What are the intangibles that go into being a good producer?
BJ: Details, details and details.
Grant Gustafson, award-winning spot editor known for his high-profile work on Anheuser Busch brands, has joined Cutters, from a dozen years at The Whitehouse and its predecessor company, The Lookinglass.
Gustafson joined in mid-August as Cutters ninth Chicago editor and the fifth partner of the 25-year old post house. The move, he says, “felt like a good career move to branch out and expand my horizons.”
“It’s exciting to have Grant join us,” says Cutters founder/president Tim McGuire.
BRUCE MONTGOMERY, a co-founder of the two-year old, ever-growing Chicago Convergence, has stepped up as president. He is CEO of Wi-Fi Technologies and executive producer and host of long-running cable show, “Technology Access Television,” on CAN-TV Ch. 21, and a member of the Mayor’s Council on Technology, among others.
Montgomery succeeds fellow Convergence founder John Patterson, Pixel Brothers’ development director, who moved to L.A.
FIRST ASSIGNMENT for Towers Productions’ new casting director, Becky Cattie is to find the perfect cast for Towers’ “Housewives of Chicago” reality TV show, currently in development.
Cattie, who moved here from L.A. last summer, has six years experience casting unscripted TV shows, including “Extreme Makeover,” “America’s Got Talent,” “My Fair Wedding,” “10 Years Younger” and “The Simple Life.”
Response to the “Housewives” casting call has been “fantastic,” says Cattie.
Everybody was expecting a revolution, but the advertising contract AFTRA and SAG signed in the early morning hours of April 1 with the Joint Policy Committee of advertising agencies and producers looks a lot like ad contracts of years past.
There are some rate hikes ($36 million total) and some new Internet structures.
But in terms of wiping out the payment structure as we know it, that was tabled for study to be decided in 2012. Class A, pay-per-play commercials, in other words, have been preserved.
WHO HE IS: The new GM/EP at Digital Kitchen production house since March 12 is relocating to Chicago from Indianapolis where he’s freelanced as a producer for some 18 years.
HOW HE VIEWS HIS JOB: Helping to coordinate the production; seeking the work; getting projects in the door and then determining the most fitting music and settings.
Filmworkers Club inaugurated a fiber uplink service that facilitates the real-time delivery of HD commercials and other media to broadcasting destinations across the U.S. The service is being offered via Vyvx, operators of the country’s largest HD network.
The service can also be used to transmit standard definition video as well as audio media.
“This is a great option for clients who can’t wait for overnight delivery,” said Filmworkers president Reid Brody.
VINCE VAUGHN, whose every meal, drink and partying fills inches of column space, will give columnists serious delirium long after his film, “The Break Up,” wraps and the players return to Hollywood.
Vaughn plans on becoming a permanent Chicago resident, by virtue of the condo he’s in the process of buying and his shiny new Illinois drivers’ license.
WARNER BROS. SETS MAJOR FEATURE IN CHICAGO. A remake of a Korean movie now called “Il Mare” (“The Sea”) will start shooting in mid-March and is expected to be here for four months. Sandra Bullock and Keanu Reeves star; Argentinean Alejandro Agresti directs. Location is a house presently being built on a lake in the Forest Preserves.
Chicago native David Auburn (“Proof”) scripted the story for Chicago. Production designer is Matthew Crowley. Production headquarters are located in the Sofitel Hotel.
“Dee Dee Rutherford,” the third film from Bob Brown and Jeff Daniels’ Purple Rose Films, shoots here in June. “Dee Dee” is a comedy about the black sheep of a blue blood family who is cut loose by her tight-laced father and must find a way to survie on her own. Brown said he was in talks with prominent actors to play the two leads.
JWT wins the $12 million Illinois Tourism account, resigned last year by BBDO.
Tom Bernadin is Leo Burnett’s new president, from Interpublic’s Lowe’s/New York — the first non-Burnetter to have that post in the agency’s 70 year history.
DDB resigned the Lottery account, citing a difference of opinion over marketing and creative.
Marguerite Juliusson has added director Dennis Manarchy and Big Deahl Productions to her representation roster.
Oh-oh!
MARTIN ON HIS OWN. Ace editor Alarick Martin amicably departed Spots BME after three-and-a- half years to work as an independent editor. “It was time to move on,” he said. “I’m going to freelance in the short run and see how it goes,” he said, noting he is positioning his talents nationally. Up first is a package of Chrysler/BBDO spots via STS Editorial in Southfield, Michigan, with which he has a work and representation arrangement. Martin is no stranger to the Detroit market; he edited for Griot Editorial for several years. Reach him at 312/909-3876.
By Dan Page
SCREENZINE.COM Music Editor
Greetings. Welcome to the new music column.
BARBIZON LIGHTING doubled its space to 4,000-sq. ft. and added much needed storage space when it moved last month to 2525 N. Elston from 2356 N. Damen. The new separate warehouse houses “an assortment of grip gear needed that day,” notes Julie Giampaolo, one of Barbizon’s five employees. Larger orders are shipped in from Barbizon warehouses throughout the country.
IN A NEW GATORADE/Element 79 spot directed by Joe Pytka, 39-year-old Michael Jordan plays a game of one-on-one against himself as a 23-year-old Chicago Bull.
SHOWTIME, and cast members from its Chicago-based hit show The Chi, along with community leaders, today to announce a $500,000 donation from the network to the City’s Gr
