Saturday, July 04, 2009
Better living through Dairy
Thursday July 2, 2009 by HM Copywriter
What’s better than a holiday weekend? A holiday weekend that starts with a trip to the Dairy Queen, natch. Chris and Wendy took a little road trip to the DQ (Fulton Street, (just down the street from HM HQ) and came back with an armload of Blizzards. That coffee bar in the lobby works equally well for dishing up the ice cream.
The Hot 100.
Thursday June 25, 2009 by HM Copywriter
There are bike rides. And there are bike rides. Our San Francisco-based AD Simon Bucktrout (that’s Simon on the left) finished the latter this month, when he and his teammate-slash-brother Justin completed a 100 mile loop around Lake Tahoe.
An extremely talented designer (he’s not reading this, is he?) and avid cyclist, Simon learned about the event, called America’s Most Beautiful Bike Ride which is organized in conjunction with Team In Training, the national organization that raises funds and awareness for The Leukemia & Lymphoma Society.
“I lost my stepfather, David, to Leukemia and this was a way to give a bit back. I’ve seen the terrible cost of leukemia and I wanted to do my bit.”
HM was happy to support Simon and Justin. We even had jerseys made in the Hanon McKendry colors.
The ride took just under six hours (incredible!), which gave the guys “time to think about a lot of stuff,” says Simon. Like how thin the air is at 7500 feet above sea level. “Your legs feel okay, but you don’t have the oxygen,” explains Simon.So is 100 miles of mountainous terrain any fun? “Oh yeah,” says Simon, “I call it life insurance. it’s good to feel your heart beat.”
Beautiful Day
Friday June 5, 2009 by HM Copywriter
It’s going to be a beautiful day. It’s the first day of Festival.
So here at Hanon-McKendry, we’re going to take a somewhat longer lunch break and immerse ourselves in music, art, and of course, food booths downtown.
To put in a plug for our friends at the GRAM, the Grand Rapids Art Museum has a great Ellsworth Kelly exhibit and a couple of beautiful Calder mobiles.
We’ll see you downtown.
The reason for Twitter
Thursday June 4, 2009 by HM Copywriter
When everyone working adults discover Twitter, their initial reaction is invariably, “What’s the point?” Which is the set up to any number of wry and/or rude remarks. But no longer.
It’s now clear that Twitter exists to generate always brief, sometimes glib and occasionally profound remarks. That infinite quantity of pith is screened (not unlike a baleen whale) and converted into… tee shirts
It seems to me that this is proof of the “infinite monkeys” theory. Stand on the beach long enough and eventually, something more substantial washes ashore. So instead of the minutia of your life being lost in the impermanent ether, it can be silkscreened onto a tee shirt, worn for a weekend and then tossed in the back of the closet.
A parting thought from Conan O’Brien, “Conan O’Brien:
“In the year 3000, YouTube, Twitter and Facebook will merge to become one mega social networking site called YouTwitFace.”
—Chia
Head start on summer
Friday May 22, 2009 by HM Copywriter
Someone (you know who you are) had a truly great idea: let’s kick off the holiday with a cookout on Thursday. So we grilled burgers and dogs, and everybody brought their favorite dish (amazingly, jellied eels didn’t turn up). We enjoyed the fresh air, ate slighly more than we should have, and the gang of thirty-odd (not thirty odd) people just hung out for a bit.
HM Copywriter : Chia Racer
We're Big Fans
Thursday May 21, 2009 by HM Copywriter
Like pretty much any creative company, we’re big on technology and design. We like new. We like shiny. We like brushed aluminum anything. No, this isn’t an Apple promo. It’s a hat-tip to a really great application (okay, three applications) called Evernote. Evernote makes up for one of my largest shortcomings as a human being (I said ONE OF), my inability to retain important information. Trivial information, I have covered. But there’s plenty of stuff you only need to remember every 60 days. Like the alarm code. Your license plate. The ingredients to Vietnamese Chicken Salad.
With Evernote, you just type it in and “presto!” It’s stored, so you can recall it whenever you need to, saving your brain for important stuff like, “Who was that guy from Public Enemy who wore the big clock?’. And it gets better: It’s a web app, a desktop app, and a mobile phone app (iPhone and Blackberry). So when you’re in the Asian aisle, trying to remember what goes into Vietnamese Chicken Salad, Evernote has your back.
Is it perfect? Nope. But it’s a great idea, executed extremely well. If you’re not Keith Richards, who can pay a man to remember things for him, check it out. (And if you ARE Keith Richards, maybe you can trim your staff by one.)
HM Copywriter : Chia Racer
Geeze Mindscape ...
Friday May 15, 2009 by HM Copywriter
Congratulations to Pete, Paul and the entire Mindscape @ Hanon McKendry Crew!
As if winning Grand Rapids Area Chamber of Commerce’s Small Business of the Year wasn’t enough, Mindscape finished out the week by being named one of the top 10 Most dependable web development firms in Central United States for the 2nd year in a row – featured in Forbes Magazine May 25th edition!
But can they dance?
HM Copywriter : Cindi Walther
Latest member of the "me too" club.
Wednesday May 13, 2009 by HM Copywriter
From the handful of decent spots in this year’s Super Bowl, we really enjoyed the CareerBuilder spot (remember the guy in his Speedo, clipping his toenails—yeah, we thought so). So we were disappointe when the Wall Street Journal reported that CareerBuilder has pulled the work from Wieden + Kennedy, and is hosting a contest to let the general public create next year’s Superbowl ad. Which is exactly what Doritos did.
There’s been plenty said about the “DYI” ad trend, so we’ll skip that discussion for today and just say, “too bad.” The W+K spot painted a pretty nice picture of “when you really need to find a new job.”
Fare thee well
Monday May 11, 2009 by HM Copywriter
Where exactly did the semester go? That’s the question posed not only by most of the Hanon McKendry staff, but by our esteemed intern Brian.
Last week, we took a few minutes out of our (as always) hectic day to wish him well and to thank him for all of his hard work. And we’d like to thank Suzy Sammons and Jane Richtsmeier for generating all that work.
We’re going to miss Brian’s laid back demeanor and “whatever you need” work ethic. On Brian’s agenda: gainful employment and learning to keep his eyes open when he gets his picture taken.
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