Mary Wells Lawrence
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Mary Wells Lawrence (born Mary Georgene Berg, 25 May 1928, in Youngstown, Ohio, United States) is a retired American advertising executive more widely known within her profession as Mary Wells.
Mary Wells was the founding president of the Wells Rich Greene (WRG) advertising agency (1966-1990) and the first woman Chief executive officer (CEO) of a company listed on the New York Stock Exchange.
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[edit] Career
In the late 1940s, Mary Wells studied for two years at the Carnegie Institute of Technology in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. She relocated to New York City, where she studied theatre and drama, and had by 1952 become Macy's fashion advertising manager.
Wells was a copywriter and copy group head at McCann Erickson in the following year, later joining the Lennen & Newell, Inc. agency's "brain trust." In 1957, Wells began her seven-year tenure at Doyle Dane Bernbach.
Mary Wells' profile in the advertising world increased dramatically in the mid-1960s when her "End of the Plain Plane" advertising campaign for Braniff International Airways was a critical factor in the airline's turnaround. With Richard Rich (treasurer) and Stewart Greene (secretary), Wells (president) founded the Wells Rich Greene (WRG) agency in 1966. Braniff remained a Wells Rich Greene client through 1968.
By 1969, she was reported to be the highest-paid executive in advertising. Wells was selected by Vice President Nelson Rockefeller to be a member of his Commission on Critical Choices for America, and invited by President Gerald Ford to represent business at an Economic Summit in Washington, D.C.
[edit] Honours
| Born to a generation of women who eventually sought to change the landscape of American culture, Mary Wells came of age at a time and place when she could also reshape the world of American Advertising. —Deborah K. Morrison, in Applegate 1994. |
- Named one of the top ten newsmakers of the 1960s by Advertising Age.
- The youngest member to be inducted into the Copywriters Hall of Fame.
- Named the 1971 Advertising Woman of the Year by the American Advertising Federation.
- Inducted into the American Advertising Federation Hall of Fame, 1999.
[edit] Slogans
A partial listing of Wells Rich Greene slogans (the first three were for Alka-Seltzer):
- Plop plop, fizz fizz.
- I can't believe I ate the whole thing. (Winner of the 1971 Clio Award.)
- Try it, you'll like it.
- I ♥ New York.
- Trust the Midas touch.
- Quality is Job 1. (For the Ford Motor Company.)
- Flick my Bic.
- Raise your hand if you're Sure.
- Friends don't let friends drive drunk.
[edit] Influences
[edit] Book
- A Big Life in Advertising. Mary Wells Lawrence. Hardcover: Alfred A. Knopf, 2002, ISBN 0-375-40912-2. Paperback: Touchstone, 2003, ISBN 0-743-24586-5.
[edit] References
- Edd Applegate. The Ad Men and Women: A Biographical Dictionary of Advertising. Greenwood Press, 1994. Hardcover: ISBN 0-313-27801-6, ISBN 978-0-313-27801-3. (Table of contents.)
- Mary Wells Lawrence. Braniff International Airways online biography.
- Mary Wells Lawrence inducted into American Advertising Federation Hall of Fame, 1999.
[edit] External links
- "An Advertising Legend." Stuart Elliott, The New York Times, May 27, 2002.
- "The (advertising) World According to Lawrence." Book Review at Knowledge@Wharton, an online publication of the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania.
- The Lady Who Got an Era. Student thesis for Fall 1996 course in the Department of Advertising in the University of Texas at Austin College of Communication. Copyright 1996, Youngseon Kim. Thesis hosted online by the University's Center for Interactive Advertising (ciAd).
