I hate my voice. But it's not bad when I yell.

I just realized that in the two years I've had this blog, I've yet to post anything I've produced. This. Changes. NOW.

The following spot was produced for Portage Place Shopping Centre during the 2010 holiday season. During this time, they were trying to promote the Globe Cinema, IMAX and Prairie Theatre Exchange all at the same time, calling it the 'Portage Place Theatre District'.

When talking to the client, she said that she was aware that Portage Place definitely wasn't the first choice for people when they wanted to go shopping, and that they've accepted that fact. Instead, they wanted to market the shopping centre as an entertainment hub where people could see a wide array of movies as well as live theatre. They also wanted people to know about their free validated heated underground parking.

I scripted and produced the spot which was approved by the client, and it aired on KICK-FM in December 2010.

Listen to it here:

Mike Choi - Portage Place by chlngch0ng

Writer/Producer: Mike Choi
Client: Portage Place Shopping Centre
Talent: Albertine Watson/Mike Choi

Bada ba ba, wait what?

When was the last time you played Monopoly? Yeah, that's what I thought.

If you want to start making some ROI again, go open your closet, reach high up for that dusty top shelf and shimmy the Monopoly box from in between Operation (which you stopped playing after it got too easy [only because the battery died]) and Mouse Trap (which you never played because the dumb contraption never worked).

McDonald's Canada ran a promotion last October for their age-old Monopoly game where customers in BC and Alberta could bring in their worthless, faded Monopoly money and trade it in for an order of large fries. Though the bills weren't worth their face value, customers benefited regardless.

People always give Mickey D's a hard time because they think the company isn't concerned about people's health and well-being. Also, there is probably a super-sized amount of people that think MacDougall's advertising towards children is slimy, deceptive and wrong. But I don't think you should connect company morals and values with an agency's.

Cossette has been delivering some great creative for Ronnie's Playhouse over the years and, believe it or not, the creative has been successful because it's been, well, creative. There hasn't been any top secret brainwash strategies put forth, or some youth-oriented marketing campaign where they said eating their food gets you better grades and makes your pimples go away.

People are going to McDonald's because tactics like iPhone apps, installations, and experiential marketing make it fun for them and give them something interesting to go in for, not just for the gross drippy "food".

And with that, here's this:


(Must eat McDonald's. Must eat McDonald's.)

The real world.

You may have been wondering where I've been for the past month or so, other than at the bottom of your blog rolls. For the first three weeks of January, I was at Velocity Branding for my work practicum.

Velocity is a local advertising agency that's made up of three account executives, three designers, and one writer. Jarrett Moffatt, a former CreComm who was in my position last year, took me under his wing since he knew exactly where I was coming from. You could say that I was like his son for a month.

(I thought this would be funny but now I realize it's just creepy.)

At my placement, I got to see the entire process that an agency goes through, from first meeting a client, to sending them proofs of their work. Luckily for me, I was able to dabble in a bit of everything. From those client meetings, I was able to write up creative briefs, conducted some research, and give Dad (Jarrett) something to start off on. As for writing, I had the opportunity to write copy for sell sheets, newspaper ads, in-store flyers, as well as radio spots.

One of the best things about my placement at Velocity was seeing the interaction and relationship between designer and writer. To see how closely they work together made me realize how important it is to start fostering this relationship as soon as humanly possible, and only reinforced my belief that CreComms and Graphic Design students should be working on projects together, right from the get-go.

On that note, I found that a lot of Velocity’s work was design based. Their designers were always click-clack-clackitting away on their computers working on websites, print materials or iPhone apps. Seeing the sheer amount of work that was always coming in and going out made me wish that I was a better designer because I can see how much more of an advantage you would have if you were able to both write and design.

Something else that I noticed, was that there was no suit vs. creative hippie separation. Now I'm not saying that they were all hippies or all suits, but rather everyone there treated each other equally. With ad agencies, there's always the stigma of mean business-type account execs looking down on and stifling the freedom of creative teams, at least that's how it seems like it is in the books I've read. At Velocity, there was always a fun, positive vibe in the office, which may or may not have been caused by the 90's hip hop that was blasting some days.

As for how this placement affected my career plans, I still would like to try my hand at being a writer for an agency. Though I realize now how small the Manitoba market is and how hard it is to try and convince people to take risks here, I foresee some sort of mini revolution in Winnipeg's ad/marketing world. At least I'm hoping for one.

Though I may not have come out of my work placement with a lot to put into a portfolio like some of my other peers, I found this to be a great learning opportunity. During my three weeks, I got to see the ups and downs of an agency. I got to witness the blood, sweat and tears that a team must shed to come up with a successful campaign. I got to see the real thing.

Thank you (in no particular order, and because I'm a gentleman, ladies first) Jarrett, Karla, Colette, Olga, Lee, and Chris x2!

Cheers and thanks for having me on board!

And the sorry saps are...

Remember how I said we would find out our client for the year? Well, I didn't lie.

Berns & Black Salon on Main street will be the ad majors' big client for this school year. They don't have a website (something to consider in our campaigns) but here's their Facebook group: SNIP SNIP SNIP

We will be getting to know them better as well as finding out what kind of style they prefer. Style? Get it? We learned today that they want to attract RRC students, and if you are willing to get a cut from one of their beauty students, you'll be able to get your hair cut for cheap (USP?).

As we learn more information, I'll update you on any advancements and cool aspects about them. Also, I've been thinking of getting a haircut. If knowing the ins and outs of your client is a major step in the advertising process, might as well get a haircut from them while I'm at it!

"Hey, try this one. All the cool cats get it."

Oh, hello.

Now that school is back in session, I guess it would be a good a time as ever to start this blog back up. Get my mind thinking about the things it should be thinking about and get my creative sauces running.

I am now officially an advertising major and will be working under the wings of Kenton Larsen, along with my fellow ad men/women.

I'm actually quite astounded by the amount of traffic this blog got during its first go, seeing about 200 views each week. But, when the posts started getting scarce, so did the amount of people that dropped by. Let's get those number back up, shall we? By the way, I have been getting a lot of random comments that are all in chinese. To whoever is doing that, stop. I'm Korean, okay? Or at least write in english please. I also wouldn't recommend clicking on any links that they post.

So, I'll be doing the usual analysis of things I've seen and think are cool in the ad world, as well as updating you on school projects. Tomorrow, we will be learning who our client is for the year. We, along with the PR students, will be separated into groups to create campaigns for a local business. After the big pitch, the client will pick one of the proposals and spit on the others. Exciting.

This is what I did this summer:



See you soon! Visit back often! Tell your friends!