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San Francisco — Cultural Changes and Landmark Locations for Advertising Agencies Part Four

Posted on August 18, 2022August 18, 2022 By Hey You

While I was at Barnum Commu­ni­ca­tions (April 7, 1976 — 1978) the agency had been in a law-suit for pirating a medical account from J. Walter Thompson. The case went on for a long time. (The”Creatives” in Barnum even created ballads sung with a guitar played by our copy­writer.) The judge­ment was that Dr. Jim Barnum was to ​“cease and desist working in the West”.
Bob Buechert and the part­ners that were left, re-named the group: Vicom Asso­ciates. The agency moved to a new loca­tion, the south east side of the third floor of 901 Battery Street, between Vallejo and Green Streets.
When the agency moved, I moved with them, we all were there in the years 1978 to 1987.
The building, orig­i­nating as a cigar ware­house, had ceil­ings that were very high, ranging from 13′8″ to 15’10”.

901 Battery Street
901 Battery Street 
901 Battery Street East Side
901 Battery Street East Side 
Parking on Vallejo Street
Parking on Vallejo Street 
My room on the North West Side
My room on the North West Side 
Luci to trace
Luci to trace 

Vicom part­ners and creatives had offices along the outside walls and cubi­cles were in the open floor area. For the good natural light, I was on the east side. My view was of ​“Busvan for Bargains” (to which I would run across the street in my spare time to find trea­sures to haul home. Good to see that it is still there.)
And where did I park? Because my assign­ments were usually discussed by the agency’s creatives in the early morning, I could usually arrive after the morning rush. The parking lot on Vallejo Street was full by then except for a corner slot that was small because of a shed. My little Datsun 510 could slip into that spot.
Later, when Vicom acquired more space on the north side of the building, I was moved down the hall to the new ​“Art Depart­ment”, a large open work space with rooms along the window side.
Vicom provided the use of a new ​“luci”, a stand-up model that lit and projected the orig­inal image from near to the floor and up to a clear glass. I could only use tracing paper to resize and copy my work. Still, it was a way. (I cannot find an image of the contrap­tion, so I show this sketch.) The Agfa photo­stat equip­ment was not included in the move to Battery Street.

The History of 901 Battery Street
901 Battery Street is listed on the historic Data­base: https://​www​.hmdb​.org/​m​.​a​s​p​?​m​=​1​9​1​466

In 1906, Raffaello Petri created the Petri AA Twins Cigars (all dry-cured tobacco. from Kentucky and Tennessee). The cigars were so popular that Petri was chosen to have a pavilion at the 1915 Panama-Pacific Expo­si­tion in San Francisco.
901 Battery Street, built in 1923, was Petri’s cigar manu­fac­turing ware­house which had 88,699 sq. ft., on four floors.

Previ­ously, in 1886, Raffaello Petri had a family run vine­yard in San Fran­cisco. After prohi­bi­tion, 1933, Petri housed his Petri Wine Company in the ware­house. In 1939 Petri spon­sored the radio program: ​“The Adven­tures of Sher­lock Holmes” and again ​“The New Adven­tures of…” from 1943 to 1946.They produced: red, white. rose. sparkling, apéritif, and dessert wines.
The photo of the early ware­house shows the Green Street side of the building. By 1953, Petri grew to be the largest producer of wines in the USA.

B-1
B-2
Petri postcard
Petri postcard 
Petri Warehouse
Petri Warehouse 
Petri wine storage
Petri wine storage 
Petri Mouse
Petri Mouse 
1958 San Francisco Advertising Art Annual
1958 San Fran­cisco Adver­tising Art Annual 
Petri Ads in 1958
Petri Ads in 1958 

San Fran­cisco Adver­tising Art’s 10th Adver­tising Art Exhi­bi­tion annual publi­ca­tion in 1958 shows two ads. The ad agency was Young & Rubicam, inc., the art director was Jack Allen and the photog­ra­phers were Ken Bess and Dale Wilson Smith. (Petri, by then, had become United Vintners.)
There is much to be found on-line.. The cigars are offered at Cigar Store House. The 1915 post­cards are shown on ebay.

Cultural Changes for the Workplace
A cultural change at this time was the way we and other busi­nesses worked. Vicom Asso­ciates had a copy machine. (The Xerox, copy machine was actu­ally invented on October 22, 1938, but it wasn’t until 1959 when it appeared and made a major change in the workplace.)

I hadn’t been aware of any new equip­ment for busi­ness use until the free-lance assign­ment I had, offered by Richard Moore. His client was to send a mailer offering this wide choice of desk-top equipment.
Richard was to illus­trate each item. (BTW, I never was able (not having the patience) to attempt architectural-realistic type illus­tra­tion.) Richard asked me to create this fellow with an arm-full of new comput­er­ized equipment.
I usually began with several tracing-paper versions of the char­acter. This was #7 of the choices.

Portable Computer
Portable Computer 
Tissue example
Tissue example 
Which Portable Computer
Which Portable Computer 

Computers for Health­care Products
In my work of medical layouts for Vicom, there were exam­ples of computer equip­ment in the medical field. There were also medical ads with artwork (concepts of the internal body) suggesting what the new comput­er­ized equip­ment, like an MRI, could show.
A layout trick for very small images: On the page that shows three very small layouts, the details of the computer was achieved by painting over a photo that was Xeroxed.
Vicom used the photo of the huge 1945 Univac computer in a six-panel folder to promote Syntex birth control pills. The brochure was presented to family prac­tices and Ob/Gyn offices.

IVAC Microinvision
IVAC Microinvision 
Biotronics Tonometer
Biotronics Tonometer 
Naprosyn
Naprosyn 
MRI for pain relief
MRI for pain relief 
Scenes computer
Scenes computer 
Brevicon Yesterday/Today folder
Brevicon Yesterday/Today folder 

Rex and I , Co-Workers, Again
When I quit Graphics to join Barnum Commu­ni­ca­tions, Rex Simmons had consid­ered moving also, but he stayed with Graphics < Corpo­rate Graphics until they also moved to 901 Battery Street, on the 2nd floor. So, when he chose to move to Vicom, he only had to carry his stuff one floor up in the elevator.
Rex Simmons had been tight friends with Bob Buechert since the late 1960s at our 680 Beach Street loca­tion. He was soon a friend with all at Vicom. Rex had creative and art director skills devel­oped through the years since his early work in London. And for Vicom, he was even a model!

Rex Model IVAC Theremometer
Rex Model IVAC Theremometer 
Bowling Shirt
Bowling Shirt 
Bowling pixs
Bowling pixs 

This ad was for IVAC the new computer version of a thermometer.
You see Rex as a patient, but as this ad was in produc­tion, the photo was referred to as:
​”The not quite dead Rex”! In no time that title was designed on T‑shirts and became the name of a one-night-only bowling team.
Ads Not Directed to the General Public
I was assigned ads that were ​“soft sell” or ​“hard sell”.
Below: my light line illus­tra­tions in this medical journal ad was for a birth control product.
The bold layout of Naprosyn 500 was to convey the power and speed to fight pain. The comp for the medical trade-show exhibit carried the same theme and offered the atten­dees, a photo-op with the race car at the finish-line.

Norinyl 135
Norinyl 135 
Layout Naprosyn
Layout Naprosyn 
Naprosyn 500 printed
Naprosyn 500 printed 
Nap PhotoOp Finish LIne
Nap PhotoOp Finish LIne 

All that was produced by Vicom was directed to the medical / health­care field, not to the public.
(This was before medical adver­tising moved into commer­cials on television.)
Here is more on Dr. Barnum and Rx ads:: https://​www​.mahf​.com/​i​n​d​u​c​t​e​e​/​d​r​-​j​i​m​-​b​a​r​n​um/
Now, the USA and New Zealand are the only coun­tries that adver­tise prescription-only phar­ma­ceu­ti­cals directly to possible consumers.

Ann Thompson
ps:
There was one more move to a new loca­tion for Vicom Asso­ciates and me. That will be in Part Five.

Geezerpedia, Of That Time

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