Looking across the water from the Hog Island Oyster Company in San Francisco’s Ferry Building, you can see the Bay Bridge as it heads toward Treasure Island, Oakland and Berkeley. With the sun riding toward the West behind us, the air is briny and the sky is the color of tangelos. We are sitting at a table, six of us, drinking beer, eating oysters, French fries and crispy fried sardines. There is a photograph somewhere, a group selfie that captures this occasion.
In the photograph, my friend Jon is leaning over toward Craig Tanimoto. But the photograph does not capture what Jon says to Craig as he leans into him. “So,” Jon asks. “How does it feel to be the man who saved Apple Computer?”
Craig Tanimoto is the guy who actually wrote the two words “Think different” for Apple. He placed the words above Thomas Edison’s head, Einstein’s head, above Ghandi’s head. And when he did, he put a ding in the universe.
But even after eighteen years since the “Think different” campaign first appeared on walls everywhere, Tanimoto has never fully taken credit for the two words he came up with in 1997, when he was an art director at Apple’s advertising agency Chiat-Day. In fact, even though Tanimoto has been rewarded for the campaign he initiated to help save Apple—and even though several other people have obliquely accepted credit, Craig Tanimoto humbly accepts an authorship that is his, and his alone.
It always goes something like this: “I don’t think anyone knew what the answer was,” says Tanimoto. And about the Think different campaign specifically: “It wasn’t what we were looking for, but it was everything that we needed.”
Back in 1997, Apple was a dark storm. IBM had seized the personal computer category—even tagging them as PCs—and there was a worldwide price war between computer companies that included Dell, Compaq, HP, Epson, Hitachi, and others best forgotten.
Apple Computers had been relegated to niche cult status. When Steve Jobs returned to Apple after his twelve-year exile, Jobs discovered that his company had been highly managed and poorly inspired. Apple only had enough working capital to pay employees for ninety days. (This was about the same time that Steve Jobs also was supporting Pixar from his personal credit card.)
Steve Jobs had ninety days to change the trajectory of his crippled company.
Craig Tanimoto was born in Oregon from Japanese-American parents. Although fully and completely American, his parents and grandparents had been placed in an internment camp during the Second World War. Craig’s family hop-skipped around the country, from Oregon to New Jersey and Torrance, California. He graduated from Langley High school in McLean, Virginia and from U.C.L.A. in the highly competitive Communications Studies program. In 1984, like millions of other Americans, he was watching the Super Bowl when Apple’s “1984” T.V. commercial appeared during the third quarter. Based on George Orwell’s book 1984, the commercial was shot by director Ridley Scott, who had just finished directing “Blade Runner”. The 1984 commercial was similar to that sci-fi classic, and featured a gray apocalyptic world inhabited by drudged-out humans on psychotropics. In the commercial, the masses are seated in an auditorium, watching their leader speaking on a wall-sized screen. Suddenly, a young woman runs through the crowd wielding a sledgehammer, which she hurtles at the screen. As the screen explodes into hot light, the announcer declares that Apple would make sure that the year 1984 did not become like the book “1984”.
Brave words. And for a young Craig Tanimoto, sitting in his cousin’s living room in Los Angeles, the “1984” spot was life-changing.
“It made an impression on me,” says Tanimoto. “It looked more like a movie than a TV spot. It made me want to get into advertising. I’d really never considered advertising before. I liked commercials—the funny ones. But ‘1984’ was different. It had scale. It seemed bigger than the platform it was coming from. Even though it only aired once, nightly news and talk shows aired it over and over. People were talking about it. I wanted this. I wanted to make messages that moved people. I wanted to do something as cool as ‘1984’.”
Tanimoto went to Chiat-Day and got a job as an intern (today the agency is known as TBWA Chiat-Day). But soon after, Steve Jobs departed Apple and John Sculley became Apple’s CEO. Ironically, Steve Jobs had recruited Sculley from Pepsi. During an interview, Jobs verbally poked Sculley and asked if Sculley wanted to spend his life selling sugar water to kids, or if he wanted to change the world.
Sculley was brought on board, and a power struggle between Jobs and Sculley ensued. When Jobs lost, Sculley quickly fired Chiat/Day and hired Pepsi’s advertising agency BBDO in New York City, the same agency that was creating the legendary Pepsi spots featuring Michael Jackson.
“I was at Chiat when we lost the account,” recalls Tanimoto. “I still remember the pit in my stomach watching my friends pack up their boxes as they left the agency.”
It would take four years of moving around the country at different agencies before Tanimoto would return to Chiat/Day as an art director on the creative staff.
By 1997, Apple was a completely different company. The stock price had plummeted to an all-time low. When a reporter asked Michael Dell at rival Dell Computers what he would do if he were CEO of the once powerful Apple, Dell quipped that he would “shut it down” and give the money back to shareholders.
At Apple headquarters in Cupertino, several Apple products were in the pipeline, but Steve Jobs saw nothing that would rejuvenate public opinion about his company.
One of Job’s top priorities was to find a new advertising agency. Chiat/Day had just been named “Agency of the Year” and were winning creative awards left and right with Nissan’s “Enjoy the Ride” campaign. Along with a shortlist of other agencies, Steve Jobs called Chiat/Day.
When the assignment came into the Chiat/Day creative department, there was no formal brief or strategy. Just one week to come up with ideas.
Executive Creative Director Lee Clow put six teams to work on the project.
“The problem was simple,” says Tanimoto. “There were no new products in the pipeline. No news. Nothing to talk about, yet Jobs had to change the perception of the brand.”
Tanimoto’s creative partner at the time was writer Eric Grunbaum. “Eric and I worked together for four years,” acknowledges Tanimoto. “We did great work. We were one of the hot teams at Chiat and had won plenty of advertising awards. Technically speaking, Eric was the word guy and I was the picture guy, but like most creative teams, we both crossed over.”
But, as luck would have it, because of other client projects the team couldn’t work together on the Apple assignment. They had to divide and conquer.
It was just another sunny morning in Venice, California. A few blocks away, surfers balanced on their boards arms outstretched, riding the morning curl. Tanimoto sat in his cube. He was pitted not only against his other co-workers, but against the teams at other agencies spread across the North American continent. There were likely to be people in London and Hong Kong working on the Apple project.
Tanimoto wanted this one. Chiat/Day’s work on Apple was legendary. Its “1984” spot had literally gotten him into the business. And for Apple, the stakes would never be higher. “This was a huge opportunity,” says Tanimoto. “I wanted to bring Apple back to Chiat/Day. Bad. I wanted to help turn Apple around.”
Creating ideas on deadline is not a linear process. There is a need to get ideas down on paper as quickly as possible. Just to release the chaff. Sometimes you can come up with an award-winning concept by noon. More often, it takes longer. Tanimoto works on sketchpads or journals where he has lots of room to doodle and write random thoughts.
“I remember I drew an Apple logo and just stared at it,” says Tanimoto. “One of my first doodles had Keith Haring-like radiation lines coming off an Apple logo. Kind of like the apple was emitting some kind of energy or power. One of my other ideas was for a painted wall. It was based on a Magritte painting, the famous ‘This is not a Pipe’—it was a kind of homage. I envisioned the traditional boxy beige Macintosh against a beige background with the headline, ‘This is not a box.’
“There was no logo except the tiny one on the Mac. The iconic shape was really the only product identifier. It was cool because it worked on so many different levels, but it was more of a one-off.”
Tanimoto continues.
“Another direction I tried was a kind of Dr. Seuss-like poem about conformists. Maybe there was something I could do with star-bellied Sneeches, something with a moral. I started writing down thoughts about being independent. Standing your ground. Being a rebel.
“Then I wrote it: Think different. I read it again. My heart started racing. I drew the Apple logo with the words beneath it.
“On the other side of my Journal, I had drawn a little picture of Thomas Edison with a radiating light bulb over his head – only instead of a light bulb I had an Apple logo. I put two and two together.
“I couldn’t believe it. Thomas Edison with the words “Think Different”. The inventor whose ideas changed the world. It had synergy. Like when 1+1 equals more than 2.
“It was cool, but could I do more with it?
“I thought about it a while and did the same idea with Einstein. His ideas completely transformed our understanding of the universe. Then I tried Gandhi—his ideas of nonviolence and civil disobedience changed the world.”
The possibilities seemed endless. The idea transcended the world of computers and engaged the living world. It was a big idea.
Then Tanimoto closed his sketchbook. No one could see the idea, he decided, until it was ready. Ideas were a commodity, easier to kill than to bring to life. The idea was too raw, too fresh, too early. Too easy to kill. Ideas are like newborn babies: you have to nurture and protect them.
“I had to think of ways to sell it,” says Tanimoto. “That night I thought of argument after argument about why the idea worked. Why it was good.”
He remembered that even the legendary Apple ‘1984’ Super Bowl spot had nearly died: Apple had gone back and forth over whether or not the spot should air and had even demanded that Chiat/Day sell off the air time. The agency was unable to sell the time, and the spot aired. History was made. But history had nearly stalled.
Tanimoto thought about his two words: “Think different.”
“It said nothing about the computer but it said everything about Apple,” muses Tanimoto today. “In a weird way, the geniuses were sort of product endorsers. But in a bigger way they were more like philosophical endorsers. ‘Think different’ celebrated individuality. People who marched to their own drummer, people who weren’t afraid to be their own person. People who broke new ground.”
“Think different” was even a competitive strategy. IBM had grown in the 1950s with a sign that famously hung in Tom Watson’s office that said, THINK.
“Think different” stood as the counter-argument. A declaration as big as making sure that “1984 wouldn’t be like ‘1984’.”
Everything seemed to be right, but Tanimoto still wasn’t sure he could sell it. It could be too radical, even for an agency as ballsy as Chiat/Day.
“For me, the idea of ‘Think different’ named and solidified what Apple stood for in the world,” says Tanimoto. “It was Apple’s battle cry.”
The next day, agency creative teams met in Chiat/Day’s war room. When Craig Tanimoto walked into the room, there were already ads plastered all over the walls. Most of the ads had photos of computers in them, a lot of them had smiling celebrities talking about their PowerBooks. There were a lot of traditional ads with headlines and visuals.
“Mine didn’t look anything like an ad,” says Tanimoto about his layouts. “[They] looked more like a photography exhibit.”
Lee Clow, Chiat/Day’s worldwide creative director and one of the creators of ‘1984’ came into the room. He walked along the walls looking at ideas, pausing at some and totally dismissing others. He was looking very quickly to get an overview of the work. When he came up to Tanimoto’s campaign he stopped and looked.
He turned to Tanimoto and said. “Shouldn’t it be ‘Think Differently’?”
“No,” answered Tanimoto.
Clow thought about it for a minute and agreed. “You’re right.” He turned to the group and announced, “Everyone’s working on this. I want to blow this execution out.”
“Think different” was the chosen campaign and was going to go to Steve Jobs.
Tanimoto was ecstatic, but at the same time he knew it was just the beginning. There were many more approval processes to go through and only a few days to get everything ready for the presentation.
“That night, I went for a drive on Pacific Coast Highway,” says Tanimoto. The top was down on his convertible. “I was feeling real good. I put in a John Lennon compilation disc on Shuffle and drove, thinking about the campaign. All of a sudden, ‘Watching the Wheels’ came on and I heard the words:
People say I'm crazy doing what I'm doing,
Well they give me all kinds of warnings
To save me from ruin,
When I say that I'm o.k.
They look at me kind of strange,
Surely you’re not happy now
You no longer play the game…
© Lenono Music
“I started drumming my hands against the steering wheel and singing. I couldn’t believe it. My eyes started to well up. In my head I saw all these black and white images of people who dared to march to a different drummer. John Lennon’s voice narrating my thoughts. I saw the whole commercial. And then at the end to sum it up, the screen fades to black and a title card comes up with the words ‘Think different.’ And then dissolve up the Apple logo. So powerful. No products, just a philosophy.”
The context for this revelation is remarkable. That same strip of Pacific Coast Highway is legendary. William Randolph Hearst and J. Paul Getty built mansions along it. Marilyn Monroe was found dead in a bungalow on the cliff just above it. Bob Dylan, James Dean, Jack Kerouac, Charlie Chaplin, Jim Morrison, even John Lennon had driven down that same stretch of blacktop.
The television idea would solidify the campaign. It was all coming together.
The next morning, Tanimoto went in to see Lee Clow. He presented the TV idea to Clow but before he could even play the song he was shot down. Clow didn’t even listen.
“If we were going to get a John Lennon song it should be ‘Imagine,’” he said. Clow spun around and walked away. Tanimoto was crushed.
A week went by. Chiat/Day had decided to present only one campaign to Steve Jobs. “Think different.” Everything was riding on it.
Lee Clow was the only one who presented to Steve Jobs in Cupertino. In usual fashion, Clow was passionate and engaging. It is unclear exactly which ads were presented, but certainly the core ads with Einstein, Edison, and Gandhi.
Jobs looked at everything and said, “It’s great. Really great. But I can’t do it. People already think I’m an egotist. If I put the Apple logo next to these geniuses I’ll get skewered by the press.”
The room was silent.
Steve kept pacing and then paused and in a voice almost to himself, he said, “What am I doing? Screw it! It’s the right thing. It’s great. Let’s talk tomorrow!”
In a matter of seconds Steve Jobs did a complete 180. The campaign was sold.
The next phase was television. It was decided that Chiat/Day would create a “Dead Poets Society”-type verse to be read against the images. While many people are credited with the writing the “Crazy Ones”, including Steve Jobs, according to Craig Tanimoto the real credit goes to Rob Siltanen: He wrote the heart of the spot including both the powerful opening and tremendous ending.
The television spot features celebrities including John Lennon, Bob Dylan, Gandhi, and others. (Later, once the campaign was running and up to speed, Steve Jobs started picking out his personal heroes. “It was kind of a free-for-all after that,” nods Tanimoto.)
In accordance with typical advertising rights, it was anticipated that each celebrity would demand at least $1 million. To make matters worse—a negotiating nightmare—many of the celebrities were deceased. It was feared that many of the estates (like Gandhi, Martin Luther King, Lennon, among others) wouldn’t agree to any form of advertising, no matter what the cost.
Securing rights from all these famous people was a major hurdle, and two things were against Chiat/Day: time and money.
Remember. At this time in its history, Apple had no money. They had originally wanted to do print ads in trade magazines. And they still only had 90 days of precious working capital. This campaign had to get on air fast.
But how?
The story of what really happened to secure celebrity rights is not widely known: About a year earlier, Chiat/Day had created a spot for their automobile client Nissan. The spot had needed a killer music track, and the song the agency wanted was Van Halen’s version of The Kinks’ “You Really Got Me”.
When the agency used traditional approaches to buy the music, the band’s lawyers reported they wanted one million dollars before they’d even approach the group.
That amount was the spot’s entire production budget and there was no way Nissan would go for it. The agency needed to find another song. They tried several work-arounds, but nothing worked. Then someone had an idea: What if the agency approached Van Halen directly?
They showed the spot to Van Halen with the music laid against picture, like a finished spot. Then they told the band members they could each pick any Nissan they wanted. It worked. Instead of costing a million dollars, the music ended up costing five 300ZX’s.
The Apple negotiations worked in a similar way. Instead of going through traditional channels, agency producers positioned the Apple spot as more of a public service. They went to the celebrity estates, showed them the spot and said Apple could donate $10,000 worth of Apple computers to the school or charity of their choice. It’s also rumored that Steve Jobs personally got involved with some of the first celebrities (like Yoko Ono) himself. Once the first few people were signed, the rest fell into place.
Unbelievably, all the rights were completed in a matter of weeks. (If Chiat/Day had waited and gone the traditional route, Apple might have possibly closed its doors before the campaign ever aired.)
In late September 1997, Apple’s television spot “The Crazy Ones” aired for the first time during the Network television premiere of “Toy Story.”
“The next day, the world felt a little different,” says Tanimoto. “I was like a proud father. The billboards and painted walls appeared all around Los Angeles overnight. The signal was sent. The message was out in the universe.”
A few days later Steve Jobs received an email, which was forwarded to Lee Clow. Clow gave it to Tanimoto. The email was a heartfelt message from a father, concerning his eleven year-old boy. In the note, the father described how his son enjoyed music, dance, and art. He was different from the other boys in school and was having a difficult time dealing with it. He wasn’t sure he liked himself. His son thought about suicide. That Sunday, father and son watched “Toy Story” on the Wonderful World of Disney and saw the Apple commercial.
After the spot, the son turned to his father and said. “Dad, that’s like me…I think different.”
The “Think different” campaign was gaining trajectory. The message touched people and resonated not only with the tiny cult of Apple enthusiasts, but with the larger world. The following year, in 1998, Steve Jobs and Jonathan Ive launched the Apple iMac which some critics declared looked more like a T.V. than the typical beige computer box.
Companies bought rows of bubbly new Macs. With its candy colors, the iMac helped permanently reset public perception of Apple. The translucent plastic body revealed the inside circuits and connecting wires for everyone to see. They showed off the computer innards as if they were proud of them.
Personal computing was no longer a mysterious hidden force, but an active member in a transformational new world. The candy-colored chassis became more than great design, with “Think different” behind them Apple products became an inspired metaphor. Each product was laden with meaning and gained an attraction that no other computer company could hold.
This returned relevance and status was material for the iMac and followed by the consumer friendliness of the iPod and then the iPhone. Apple products became so popular, they were being stashed into suitcases and carried to faraway places like Moscow and Beijing. Apple stores were such unique experiences that fake stores were erected in China just so Chinese masses could feel a part of the buzz.
But we are way, way ahead of ourselves: Back to 1997. After the first quarter the “Think Different” campaign ran, Apple reported its first profit in two years. Within the next twelve months, the Apple stock price tripled. Today Apple is the largest, most successful company in the world.
Margin note: Dell Computers still exists, but only fractionally.
Did the “Think different” campaign save Apple? The simple fact is, the “Think different” campaign—and the subsequent bubbly Apple Mac computers that followed that advertising in 1998, did help save Apple.
Tanimoto is humble. When asked the question, he shrugs. Maybe. Everything came together. It shifted the trajectory of a company.
“Have you ever had an idea that you wanted to get out into the world but you didn’t know how to get it out there?” says Tanimoto. “To win the fight for great ideas you need a lot of things to happen. In the case of ‘Think Different’ it was the right time, the right place, the right agency, the perfect storm of people who shared passion, vision and the will to fight. I wanted to make messages that moved people. I wanted to do something as cool as ‘1984’. In 1997, I had my chance.”
The ones who are crazy enough to think they can change the world, are the ones that do.
