Career
The current trend with Curriculum Vitae is to start with the present day and work back.
This isn’t a CV but more of a historical document so I have no qualms about starting at the beginning.
Stewart Cowcher
Invited to join, direct from college, as a designer and quickly progressed to Art Director.
Winner and runner-up of the Australian Institute of Management Design Award.
First Australian to have a typeface produced by Meccanorma International – Blowfly Black.
Work exhibited in International Art Director’s Annual.
Michael Peters & Partners, London
Designer and Typographer. At the time, Michael Peters was the premier package designer in London and winner of countless D&AD pencils. I was the resident Bruce.
Noel Paton
Art Director, working on the Officer Recruitment campaign for the Army.
Manchester Polytechnic, UK
Through the Alwyn Gibson Fellowship for Advanced Studies in Graphic Design, I developed a total corporate signing system for the geographically fragmented Manchester Polytechnic. I started my own design firm and developed a major corporate identity program for Pochin Constructions.
Work exhibited in Modern Publicity and Graphis Annual.
Hayes Cowcher Dailey
Art Director, working on the State Bank of Victoria, 4711, Mateus Rose accounts.
Started what was to be a 22 year relationship with writer Mike Dornau.
Ogilvy & Mather
Senior Art Director. During my time at O&M billings increased four-fold to $80 million.
Executive Art Director O&M Melbourne.
O&M European Study Tour.
Monahan Dayman Adams
Senior Art Director working on many government campaigns.
Also, watching Philip Adams decide if he wanted to remain in advertising or not.
Begg Dow Priday
Senior Art Director in a boutique agency that offered its clients advertising that was a little off the mainstream.
MADC Judge.
Dancer Fitzgerald Sample
Founding Partner and Creative Director of the Melbourne office. The agency was established primarily to service the Toyota account in Australia. However it quickly grew with new clients such as The Northern Territory Tourist Commission, Jarrah Coffee, Phillip Morris and Wendy’s Hamburgers. During this period Toyota moved from number 4 to number 2 in combined vehicle sales.
MADC Committee.
MADC Judge.
Elected to Board of DFS Australia.
National Creative Director DFS Australia.
Award Judge.
‘My Choice’ Column in Ad News.
Award School Committee.
Ad News Feature Article.
Foote Cone & Belding
Creative Director. Here I had the thrill of working with the great actor Penelope Keith on the equally great brand Heinz.
‘My Choice’ Column in Ad News.
Award School Lecturer.
Award Judge.
Young & Rubicam
Creative Director. Pitched and retained the $10 million ANZ Bank business within 2 weeks of arriving.
Award School Lecturer.
Copy School Guest Lecturer.
Award Judge.
Dornau & Stainsby
Formed an agency with Mike Dornau with offices above the Rose and Crown Hotel in Port Melbourne. Created an in-house layout system using Digi-Fonts. This radically reduced design time.
Dornau Stainsby Shearn
Put on Brock Shearn as the managing partner. Brought in major accounts such as Norwich, Southcorp Packaging and Valvoline.
Dornau Stainsby Shearn Bozell
Bozell Worldwide acquired a 20% shareholding in the agency and added their name. I undertook the creative responsibility for computerising the studio with Apple Macintosh’s, and the training of young Mac designers as art directors. This direction allowed more in house control of the creative product and enormous reduction of turn-a-round time, but most of all a freshness of approach that is only available through this very flexible system.
I have also been involved in the MADC Mentor Scheme and Award School Training Program over this time.
Wilson Everard
When I took on the role of Creative Director at Wilson Everard I was told it was going to be the toughest job in the business. After all how can you be the Creative Director in an agency run by two Creative Directors.
The agency has a retail approach and I was given the task of lifting standards and creating an individual “look and feel” for each of its clients.
The agency had grown from very simple origins and lacked the infrastructure of other medium sized businesses. I developed a briefing system that focused the client’s strategies on a longer term and planned marketing approach.
I created the “I like it” campaign for Harris Scarfe Department stores. This was instumental in helping the agency win the business and resulted in it setting up an Adelaide office.
I was again heavily involved in staff training.
Lecturing in advertising at RMIT University
My four years at RMIT were extremely rewarding and educational.
I realised after my first week that I had a lot of practical experience in the business of advertising but little knowledge of its history.
A crash course in the past gave me a much better understanding of the present and an insight into the future.
Most of the students were a joy to work with.
For a number of them I have been lucky enough to be both their teacher and their colleague in recent years.
Cummins and Partners
I was fortunate enough to hire a very young Sean Cummins back in the 80s’
Since that time he has built a national agency network with blue chip clients and high creative standards.
Sean is one of Australia’s smartest and most astute advertising practitioners.
I therefore had no hesitation in accepting his offer to work in the Melbourne office as The Brand Identity Director.
To this day I have no idea what that was.
However I did get to work on some great brands, like Schmackos, Victoria University, Virgin Blue, Kmart, CGU Insurance and many others.
I also got to work with some great people.
Bruce Stainsby Creative (Moustache)
I have always run a creative consultancy and still do.
I work directly with clients and agencies in developing new products, marketing and business plans.
It gives me the opportunity to broaden my experiences by working on a wide range of categories.
Creativity, when only applied to advertising, is limited. I have found that by applying creative thinking to problem solving, in a broader sense, many more opportunities are available.