George Lois Advertising Quotations

When I lecture kids, I say, 'You've got to be ambitious by the advertising - ambitious. You've got to say, 'See, this product? Maybe I can change the world with this product.'' They look at me like I'm nuts, but that's what you can do.

All the people who run agencies, all the important people in agencies have taken communication courses, marketing courses, advertising courses, and courses basically teach advertising as a science, and advertising is so far from a science it isn't even funny. Advertising is an art.

When you think of a brand, you should immediately understand it from the advertising attitude, from the words and visuals.

It's almost as if creativity is dead. The visual power of advertising was everywhere - now it's basically gone.

I'm sounding like an old fart talking about how bad advertising is today, but it's true. Advertising sucks. Guys like me and Bob Gage and certainly Bill Bernbach and two or three other guys, we exemplified and led the creative revolution.

Advertising, an art, is constantly besieged and compromised by logicians and technocrats, the scientists of our profession who wildly miss the main point about everything we do…

With the way I worked, a client can give me everything they know about something, and then I go away and come back with advertising that knocks them out of their chair. They finally understand what kind of a company they are.

Because advertising and marketing is an art, the solution to each new problem or challenge should begin with a blank canvas and an open mind, not with the nervous borrowings of other people's mediocrities. That's precisely what 'trends' are - a search for something 'safe' - and why a reliance on them leads to oblivion.

To me, great advertising can make food taste better, can make your car run smoother. It can change your perception of something. Is it wrong to change your perception about something? Of course not. I'm not lying; I'm just saying, 'This one's more fun, this one's more exciting.'