Bill Bernbach

Bill Bernbach, was an advertising creative director and was the renowned founder of advertising agency, Doyle Dane Bernbach.  He created some of the agencies most famous ad campaigns, and has had a lasting impact on the advertising industry.  Bill Bernbach is a classic example of someone who tries to looks at problems from a different angle to solve it.   Bernbach’s famous VW Beetle adverts show how he comes at problems from different angles to solve the problem.  At the time the VW Beetle was thought of as a Nazi invent car as it was in fact Adolf Hitler who gave them the order to invent a ‘people’s car’.  So after the war Bernbach was given the job of selling this to America.  Not exactly an easy task I think you’ll agree.  Made even more difficult as the VW Beetle is a small car and the cars that were currently being driven by Americans were big gas guzzling machines.

He came up with an ad campaign that was to be truthful about the product.  ‘Think small’ obviously trying to sell it on the fact that is a small car.  He’s not going to try to sell the car as something it’s not.  This poster suits it perfectly with Bernbach using negative space amazingly well and still making the car stand out. 

Here’s another one of the ads were he’s playing on the fact that the Beetle hasn’t changed in over 30 years.  Almost saying that the car is already perfect, no change needed. 

This poster promoting the fact that the VW Beetle is made up of simple parts that you can get hold of anywhere and can be fixed easily. 

All these posters play on the simple truths of the product there trying to sell.  This is what makes the designs so memorable, it was something that hadn’t been looked at before and really stood out.