Advertising Today [ILLUSTRATED] (Hardcover)

by Warren Berger (Author)

Editorial Reviews

Product Description
More than a means of moving merchandise, advertising has been increasingly recognized not only as an art form all of its own, but also as a defining element of popular culture. Advertising Today provides a thematic overview of the evolution of advertising around the world over the past thirty years, charting influences from the political and social upheavals of the 1960s to the influence of the Internet in the 1990s. Each chapter includes an interview with a key figure in advertising – including Italy's Oliviero Toscani of the controversial Benetton campaigns, American comedian and American-Express spokesperson Jerry Seinfeld, and British adman John Hegarty of Bartle Boyle Hegarty, creator of the world-famous Levi's ads. In analysing specific advertisements, the book simultaneously acts as a history of sorts of global pop culture and a record of the social, cultural, and geo-political temperature-changes that affect our image-saturated environment. Included are over 500 advertisements originally seen in a wide range of media: print, television, billboards, the Internet, and even the very recent, so-called 'guerrilla' advertising – in which practically anything (pieces of fruit, sand dunes on a beach, sidewalks) can act as a surface for promoting a product.

About the Author
Warren Berger is a journalist who is particularly known for his writing on advertising. He has written extensively about the subject for industry publications like Advertising Age, Adweek, Graphis, and Communication Arts, and for the mainstream press, including The New York Times, The Los Angeles Times, GQ, and Wired, where he is currently a contributing editor. Berger is also the founding editor of One, a quarterly, New York-based publication that spotlights and reviews the best of contemporary advertisements; it is produced in conjunction with The One Show, an annual awards program. Author's Residence: Mt. Kisco, New York

Product Details

• Hardcover: 512 pages
• Publisher: Phaidon Press; illustrated edition edition (June 13, 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 071483923X
• ISBN-13: 978-0714839233
• Product Dimensions: 11.7 x 10.2 x 2.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 7.5 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.9 out of 5 stars See all reviews (7 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #1,175,970 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

9 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The Advertising Bible, July 14, 2001

By	Madeline T Brigden "tbrigden" (Windham, NY United States) - See all my reviews

Wow! Every once in a while, maybe every decade, a book comes along that explores its subject so well, it truly is a BIBLE. That's this book on the ad game. Advertising has always affected me strongly---making me cry(the old AT&T "call home"), made me laugh("it must be the puppy chow" dog), made me puke(most any car ads, except the Crocidille Dundee ones, and ALL insurance commercials). Now, after reading this book, I understand more the why and how this stuff gets under my skin. If you're looking for a solid, thorough, complete take on the world of advertising, Berger's big, big text will give it to you. For a look at the hot-shots, tastemakers, and tastebreakers, the interviews are fast, punchy, pithy, funny, and sometimes infuriating. And for an entertaining overview, there are hundreds of color photos of favorite, famous, and infamous ads, with straight-from-the-horse's mouth captions. For all those wanna-be CEOs, who spend a fortune on MBAs in marketing(I have one in my family!!!!), save your time and money, all you need to know is here. What's Berger's next subject?

7 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Got advertising?, October 2, 2002

By	Michael K. Smith (Gonzales, Louisiana) - See all my reviews (TOP 500 REVIEWER)

Hardly anyone outside the industry itself has a high opinion of advertising, and I'm probably no different -- most of the time. However, I've long appreciated the occasional high degree of originality and wit of which ad writers and artists have shown themselves capable, especially since the late 1950s. This fat volume brings all of them together, beginning with Volkwagen's groundbreaking "Think Small" campaign. There are chapters on the influence of European copywriting on American ads, the development of a new "visual language," the rise of backhanded "oddvertising," the growth of advertising as a reflection of (and finally an agent of) social change, and the advent of guerilla anti-advertising, each of them an entertaining and instructive mix of graphics and text. There's even a separate chapter on the ups and downs of the famous and long-running "Got Milk?" campaign. This gorgeous book will keep you studying the artwork and reading the discussions far into the night.

7 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars You get a lot of book for your money, November 29, 2001

By A Customer

This isn't just a book for ad students and insiders, though I imagine they'd love it. I'm not an ad junkie myself, but I happen to love this book because it's a very different and interesting coffee table book, that you can spend hours looking at. The ads featured in the book are amazing - funny, clever, intriguing, sometimes works of art in themselves. And the captions explain what's going on, all that sly thinking and logic behind the ads. I find it's the kind of book that really gets people talking. But be forewarned - it's a huge book, so make sure you have a strong coffee table!