Most people don’t read copy. Clearly, you’re more intelligent than most people.

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Look at you go. Your eyes, so nimble, dancing about. Your brain, so thick and lustrous and gooey, assembling words out of ancient symbols. Truly, you are a genius, or at least a savant. The last reader! Perhaps one day we will find ourselves in a human zoo: me writing; you, the last reader, in the cage opposite, reading what I have written. Separate, but united by our unspoken understanding and our mutual love of bananas.

But I digress. The site! It is a reliquary. The collected works of me, Mike Peterson, last of the great roaming word-apes. All of this madness exists out there in the world, or did at one time. Now it has been taxonomized and displayed for your amusement. So go on, amuse yourself. Pick a media and see what tickles you.

MAZDA direct mail campaign

Did some work for MAZDA (with their AOR “Garage”) in support of a great big brand re-launch. The campaign theme was “What do you drive?”

One of the more important programs was an owner-loyalty system, for drivers whose leases were almost up. This was referred to as the “off-lease” program, though I always called it “off-leash.” I’m wacky that way.

We presented a new approach, based on mailing a series of postcards, in a variable order (depending on user data) over the course of 9 months preceding the lease-end date. This would replace a 2-part system, pamphlet and letter. The idea was that each card would be single-minded, hitting one of the main bullet points with each mailing.

The program used content-variable modular printing. What we know about the owner-prospect would affect the content, frequency and timing of the postcards received. Basically, it’s Borg technology. Resistance is futile.

Image 1: A comp example of how a series might play out. The example vehicle is MAZDA’s flagship, the Miata.

mazda-OLP

CW: Mike Peterson+AD:Kitty Song+Agency:Garage

RebuildUS dot com

I spent the better part of two years as the senior member of a small creative/development team for RebuildUS.com. During this time I had a hand in everything (including but not limited to: Project Management, UX, UI, Creative, Copy, Art, legal, PR, email campaigns, Vendor Management, Process Design, Process Management, Inventory Control, Inventory Management, and even Investor Services). Oh, the omnigraffles I’ve known.

I’ve heard people say “everyone should work at a start-up at some point.” Those people are sadists. Avoid them.

I recently discovered a cache of comps from those dark days, a handful of the hundreds of variants. I’ll save you from the wonkier pages, but here are some top-level ones.

Image 1: A landing/conversion page. I liked the simplicity of the landing page approach to getting new members. The home page was (ahem) something for everybody, but the landing pages could focus on a simple message for a single audience.

button for packy.v2 copyIt’s complicated, but RebuildUS was attempting to be a matchmaker service. RebuildUS homebuyers would receive person-to-person (seller financing) from  low-level investors. This process sidestepped the banks and put foreclosed houses back on the market at a realistic (well below market) value. That’s the theory.

Image 2: A landing page for the other side of membership.

rbu.landing.RS_beta_MP_1.3 copy

 

IMAGE 3: GALLERY PROMO FOR THE HOMEPAGE

rotator-placeholder4 copy

 

IMAGE 4: AN EARLY VERSION OF THE HOMEPAGE, with lots of DOODADS and geegaws

Early RebuildUS homepageCD/CW: Mike Peterson+CD/AD: Justin Larsen+Agency: None

 

Bad Neighbors website

This is my game and this is the site I made for it. Man, it was nice having me as a client. What do you think of the copy? I asked myself. Awesome! I told myself. How about the design? Nice and clean, I said. Then I pulled a muscle high-fiving myself.

CW: MP + AD: MP + Client: MP/cuddle manor +Dev: Jason Mecum

Manchester Gundog -Poster

Two layouts. Because I love you. The version above is the “real” one, but I prefer the art director’s version (below).

Look at that fancy, aesthetically pleasing, and relevant border treatment. Although, to be totally technical, the product is all wrong.

CW: Mike Peterson AD: Jason Busa Agency: Big Bang

BONUS:

Gatorade- Rich Banner

Camera-controlled mini-game for gatorade. Mandatories included using the “signature” cup. Don’t ask me, I just work here.

CW: Mike Peterson AD: Pakko (Francisco A. De La Torre-Rocha) Agency: TBWA Chiat/TEQUILA

Nissan Altima -OOH

Altima OOH -Sun

Altima OOH -Salt

 

The board is designed/constructed to decay rapidly while leaving the altima (car) pristine. The decay reveals a hidden message: built to last.

CW: Mike Peterson AD: Jes Garrido Agency: TBWA chiat-day/TEQUILA

The Sackful

3_sackful1
White Castle was the original fast-food restaurant. And back in their heyday (before McDonalds), they had a company newsletter called “White Castle Official House Organ.” The Sackful was my attempt to reintroduce that. In keeping with their product, it’s hamburger-centric and onion-ey.

The Crave is Calling

White Castle CraveThe client (who is actually a wonderful client) asked us to support a campaign created by their traditional agency. The campaign featured a character known only as “the Crave.” The character is basically a burger (inanimate) in an egg chair, with a phone (beige), who had a habit of dialing (but not speaking to) people at inopportune times.

We concepted and created a site that recast “the Crave” as an evil (yet silent) genius; sort of a brain-in-a-jar-type. The site would give you an inside look at his nefarious lair, buried deep within the steamy magma of Slider Island.

Within the lair, you could spy on the crave’s henchmen, or test new experimental sandwiches on rats, monkeys, ratmonkeys, the henchmen, and other disadvantaged mammals. Or you could play wonderful, absurd games including a Supermario-style quest where you must carefully guide a beautiful pig princess through a dangerous and arbitrary maze. Only at the end of the level can you drop the princess through a meat grinder, transforming her from a beautiful pork princess into a beautiful pulled-pork sandwich.

At night, to emphasize White Castle’s long tradition of 24-hr dine-in service, the site takes a psychedelic turn, becomes Night-Castle. The lair is black-lit with dayglo accents and velvet posters. Teddy Pendergrass* sets the mood by singing soulfully about the very special love between a man or a woman and a burger with onions.

Anyway, that was the plan, last I checked.

 *Or, more likely, a cheap Teddy Pendergrass imitator.

Eat better do better dot org -OOH

Yogurt

Candy

Childhood obesity is a growing crisis in Ohio. Many parents just don’t understand the basics of good nutrition. They don’t know good foods from bad, or if they do, have trouble providing or preparing good food. Our effort to educate the parents started with these outdoor boards and continued online. Once there, eligible folks could also sign up their kids for federally funded school meals.

Eat better do better dot org

Mariachi Hero

mariachi1
mariachi2
mariachi3
Before “Rock Band” and “Guitar Hero II” there was a little idea I cooked up* with a brilliant young art director  for our stodgy liquor (tequila) client. Mariachi Hero!

Unfortunately, as is the case with most of my highly-amusing internet ideas, the client wanted no part of it.**   Now it’s available for sale at a reasonable price, plus development costs. How reasonable? Well, if you’re cheap, just steal it and find your own programmers. What a bargain!

*In my own spare time, natch.
**The above version has been repurposed for el vaquero, which is (the way I understand it) some kind of college mexican restaurant chain. Personally, I only eat at nameless taco trucks, but they don’t really “get” the internet.

Oktoberfiesta Poster

Oktoberfiesta

CW: Mike Peterson – AD: Brad Dundas – Agency: FCB

Agency self-promo for a party. Always the best or worst assignment.