Joe Erwin, President of Erwin-Penland Advertising

UpstatebizSC:
What is your education and background?

Joe Erwin:
I attended East Side High School in Greenville and Clemson University where I participated in debate and cheerleading, including being the mike man at college football games.  I loved college.

UpstatebizSC:
How and when did you get in to advertising?

Joe Erwin:
One of my favorite courses at Clemson was Public Opinion and Propaganda where we created ads for imaginary political campaigns. I found the whole process of marketing fascinating and it inspired me to apply for a job at Leslie Advertising in Greenville, at the time, the second biggest advertising shop in the city behind Henderson Advertising. 

I worked at Leslie for two and a half years before being approached by a headhunter about a job at an agency in New York.  Jerry Richardson, owner of Spartan Food Systems and a chain of restaurants throughout the Southeast called Quincy’s Family Steakhouse, had hired a New York agency, Benton & Bowles, to do his advertising.  After a few meetings in New York with the team, he specifically requested to have someone on the account who understood the Quincy’s brand, or as they put it, someone who could speak Southern. I packed my bags and headed to Manhattan.

UpstatebizSC:
How did you get back to South Carolina and to owning your own agency?  What inspired you to start your own business?

Joe Erwin:
While in New York, I had married Gretchen, who I had met at Leslie Advertising and who had moved to be with me in New York.  New York is fun when you are young and crazy, but we did not want to raise a family there.  

We started putting feelers out about returning South.  My former boss at Leslie told me about a one man shop called Penland Advertising in Greenville that might be for sale at the right price.  Initially, I was very reluctant to even consider it, but he convinced me that it did come with one big advantage –an account that could give us some steady revenue while we went out and tried to build the business.  In 1986, Gretchen and I bought Penland Advertising.

Looking back, my Dad’s passing when I was 12 years old became a defining moment in my life.  It put me in a position at a young age as man of the house and a strong feeling that I wanted to make sure that the Erwin name meant something, to own a company.

UpstatebizSC:
How did the business grow over the 5 and 10 years?

Joe Erwin:
Growth was pretty slow at first, but after the third year, it picked up to the point that we were able to bring our good friend, Allen Bosworth, into the business. Allen, a brilliant strategic thinker, handled client service; I focused my time on the creative process; and Gretchen oversaw the media buys. It was a good mix of talent and we were able to grow the business at an average of 20% over the next several years. 

UpstatebizSC:
What were some of the biggest accounts that you worked for?

Joe Erwin:
I had called several times on a company called Metro Mobile that had operations in Greenville, Columbia, and Charlotte.  It was the advent of mobile communications as an industry – phones fixed into people’s cars, portable phones with huge boxes that you carried around.  The President, Jack Plating, was always very gracious, but told me that he already had a relationship with an agency out of Albuquerque, New Mexico and that he was happy.

One day, Jack called me up out of the blue and said that he needed a post card dropped in the mail in two days, and that his agency had told him it couldn’t be done. We jumped on the opportunity and worked day and night to get the job done. Jack was so impressed with our efforts that he rewarded us with his business. Metro Mobile became Bell Atlantic Mobile which became NYNEX Mobile which eventually rolled into what we now know as Verizon Wireless – with Jack Plating as COO!  Through the years, we have always had the opportunity to compete for Verizon’s business, many times against much larger agencies. Today we handle all of the retail advertising for Verizon in the nation. That one event, saying we would go the extra mile for Metro Mobile, was transformational for our agency.

UpstatebizSC:
How has the state economy over the past 18 months affected your decision-making at the agency?

Joe Erwin:
We have maintained a good business through this recession and in fact we have added new clients.  We are a marketing partner for some pretty big companies: Denny’s, BMW, the Uniroyal brand at Michelin, and Verizon retail.  When the recession hit, many of these partners came to us and said that they wanted to continue to do business with us, but that we needed to adjust our fees.  As our fixed costs have not changed, and as we have made a decision to maintain staff, we have had to tighten our belt in other areas. As a result, our margins are lower.

UpstatebizSC:
What metrics do you use to measure success?

Joe Erwin:
Top line revenue is obviously very important.  Many business figures can be twisted to make a company look good, but it’s hard to spin net billings. 

Headcount is also a very important measure of success for me.  If you are growing your work program, you will need to hire talented people to get the work done. An advertising agency is driven by young, extremely creative people; I have always been proud to provide a home for that creative talent. Twenty-four years in business and we now employ 250 people.  That is the fun part for me. 

UpstatebizSC:
What is the ownership structure of Erwin-Penland?

Joe Erwin:
Five years ago, Gretchen, Allen and I sold 100% of the stock of the company to the Hill Holliday network of agencies. The sale has been a great merger of two companies that share the same values and a similar culture.  They are great people, creative, smart, and ambitious, who give us a great deal of leeway when it comes to the management of Erwin-Penland.

UpstatebizSC:
Why did you sell?

Joe Erwin:
The process of being bought out did not happen over night; it was a two year courtship.  We sold for defensive reasons.  Verizon had grown to represent 40% of our business, but they had become so large with so many different agencies that they hired a consultant to look for ways to improve their efficiencies.  When it became clear that Verizon was going to roll up their work into fewer agencies and that the cuts were likely to affect the smaller independent agencies such as ours, we looked for solutions. If we lost Verizon, we would lose 50% of our staff.

Hill Holliday was a big firm that controlled most of Verizon’s business in the Northeast; we had much of the Southeast.  It made more sense for Erwin-Penland to become part of the Hill Holliday family of companies.

As an entrepreneur, you put a lot of sweat equity into your business.  Sometimes, it’s nice to have a reward for all that hard work.  Selling the company was tough, but in some ways, an affirmation for me as a businessman.

UpstatebizSC:
How has your role changed at the agency under the new ownership structure?  Was it tough giving up control?

Joe Erwin:
Allen, Gretchen and I agreed to employment contracts with the new firm.  Gretchen has since retired, but Allen and I still maintain control of strategic decisions. It was an adjustment having to report to someone as your boss, but Hill Holliday is not a top down organization.  We have exceeded their goals for our contribution to company profitability so they pretty much stay out of the day-to-day decisions of Erwin-Penland. I’m sure that if that ever changes, we will hear about it, but for the moment, it’s not that different than it was when we owned it.  

We just moved into a third building here in downtown Greenville, and working in a collaborative industry, where you work as a team, having three buildings is proving impractical. If it were just me, I would be planning to move into a new building, but since we are working with a parent company, that kind of decision is not mine alone to make anymore. 

When I first started the company, my attitude towards the employees was always, I hire you; you work for me.  Somewhere along the way it switched to I work for you. They don’t let me near the crayons much anymore around here; nobody counts on me anymore to get ads out the door.  My role is more strategic, working to put the agency in a position to win in the marketplace so we can continue to employ this many people.

UpstatebizSC:
What is the key to success in your industry in this challenging economic time? 

Joe Erwin:
You have to care desperately about your clients’ success. This is a relationship business so the relationships you develop with your customers have to be even stronger than ever.  We succeed in growing when our clients grow.  To do that, we need to find creative solutions to help our clients and not deliver cookie cutter, one-size-fits-all solutions. 

UpstatebizSC:
What are you most proud of in all your years in this industry?

Joe Erwin:
I have a great appreciation for young people entering into advertising. Many come into the business thinking it is going to be very glamorous, commercial shoots in New York etc.  In reality, most of this business is challenging, hard work, which can at times be borderline chaotic. To help those young people get a start in this industry, in our sixth year in business, we started an internship program that I am incredibly proud of.  It combines best practices from a number of different top notch programs around the country.  My wife, Gretchen, had seen a great program at Dancer Fitzgerald Sample (later acquired by Saatchi & Saatchi) and I was familiar with the program at Benton & Bowles Advertising in New York, one of the great New York agencies. Many graduates from our intern program have gone on to the big cities and have had successful careers at top agencies around the county. Our interns walk out of here with an impressive portfolio.

UpstatebizSC:
How is the market for young people entering the industry these days?

Joe Erwin:
It’s intensively competitive right now. We had 225 applications this year for the eight positions that are available in our internship program.  It’s a tough market.

UpstatebizSC:
You have been involved with politics from an early age.  What is it that appeals to you about the political process? 

Joe Erwin:
I did get into politics at an early age, but other than my time as student body president at my high school, I never ran for political office myself.  I have spent most of my time either volunteering for campaigns or helping drum up support for the Democratic Party here in South Carolina as Party Chair.

My introduction to politics and politicians was volunteering for Dick Riley, one of the best politicians this state has ever produced.  As a teenager, I worked for his campaign for Governor going door to door in neighborhoods.  Dick Riley is the person who more than any other made me feel good about politics and the political process.  Politics is unseemly at times, but I have seen too many times how it can improve the lives of people, and neighborhoods.  I’m not in favor of big taxes, but I am in favor of helping people who are less fortunate.  I believe in a hand up, not a hand out.  I came from a family that was not well off.  I would never have been able to attend college if it were not for government assistance. 

UpstatebizSC:
You host a conference that has creativity as its theme called Food for Thought. What are the origins of this conference?

Joe Erwin:
It was grown out of a frustration that many of the top recruits that we looked to bring to Erwin-Penland had never even heard of Greenville, SC.  We needed to do something unique to put Greenville on the map from a creativity standpoint. We wanted people to go back to their cities and say that they just saw the coolest town in America.

But it had to be something totally different, more than just a traditional, seminar type setting where you watch presentations in conference rooms.  We wanted for it to be small, intimate, and interactive.

Food for Thought is limited to 70 people.  We hold the event at multiple venues over a two and half day period – outside meetings at Michelin North America, at Fluor Field, at the BMW driving Center.  It is very participatory, intimate, and allows the attendees to have some one-on-one time with the people that we bring in to present.

92% of the attendees the first year said that was the best conference they had ever been to.

UpstatebizSC:
Why the food theme?

Joe Erwin:
Each person on the team that came up with this idea is a foodie. Good restaurants in a town are a game changer economically and Greenville has some amazing restaurants that we wanted to highlight to our guests.  

When we sit down together and break bread with other people, that is when we let our defenses down and when we are at our most creative. Any time you need to come up with creative solutions to problems, you should always do that at the table. That’s not a new concept, in fact, it can be traced all the way back to the beginnings of time.

UpstatebizSC:
How has the role of marketing and advertising evolved over the life of the firm? What trends do you see in the role of a marketing firm over the next decade?

Joe Erwin:
Marketing right now is much more of a one-on-one experience where the consumer is much more in charge of the relationship.  Consumers need to opt in to the marketing experience because if they don’t, they can turn you off in a millisecond. 

Public relations, your web site, social media, and traditional media – the marketing program has to be integrated and holistic in its approach. It has to reach people in every space and place.  We experience brands in different ways and at different times. It used to be enough just to put a smart ad on network television and run it repeatedly. While TV is still important, in fact, we believe is still king, the TV spot is the last thing that we talk about when doing the strategy development for a brand.

Another major trend is event marketing to let the consumer get to know your brand at a personal level. We call this experiencial branding.  For example, we just installed a massive space where consumers can walk in and experience all the products that Verizon has at the Staples Center in Los Angeles. It’s like Disney World for Verizon. People can’t buy the product there, but they can experience them.  We are creating similar environments for the new Giants/Jets football stadium in New York and at dozens of prime venues around the country.  All from right here in Greenville, SC. 

 

Joe Erwin is President of Erwin-Penland, a 250-person marketing firm headquartered in Greenville.  He serves on the board of the Partnership for a Drug-Free America and co-founded the national creativity conference Food for Thought, which held its third annual event in Greenville last month.