With Ad Age Now 80, an Interesting Look Back

I don't read Advertising Age--or even its website--as often as I should, but I do occasionally peruse it, especially as I look for interesting things to write about on this blog.

In looking at the Ad Age website today, I was intrigued by coverage of their own Digital Conference, as well as the top story in this week's magazine, about how after spending billions blasting each other's wireless phone coverage, AT&T and Verizon have seemingly reached a detente and will embark on new ad campaigns. Thus, Luke Wilson is looking for work again.

But the most interesting thing on AdAge.com isn't about hot trends, great campaigns, the present or the future. Rather, it's that this is the magazine's 80th year of existence, which the site commemorates with an informative special section, highlighted by a timeline showing what's happened in advertising, and the world, over the last 8 decades.

The magazine's 12-page debut edition from January 1930 is shown above, and not only do I find the central front page story--Federal Expert Tells Food Advertisers To Get Housewife's View--somewhat fascinating, it's interesting to read that the issue included coverage of several brands still in existence today, including Time, The New Yorker, Quaker Oats, Buick, NBC and Gillette.

As this article about Ad Age's milestone points out, Ad Age has covered the rise of new media -- again and again: Radio, which went from essentially zero to 55% household penetration in 12 years; TV (0.4% to 55% penetration in six years); cable (6% to 50% in 19 years); internet (broadband penetration soared from 1.7% to 54% in eight years).

It was also cool to glean some eye-opening tidbits from the timeline, such as:

1937 American Tobacco Co. struck deals with a handful of U.S. senators to endorse Lucky Strike cigarettes. In a testimonial ad, North Dakota Sen. Gerald P. Nye praised the "comfort and safety a light smoke gives my throat." The senators each received $1,000; some gave it to charity.

1945 Ad Age published the first Agency Report. Five largest agencies: J. Walter Thompson (now JWT); Young & Rubicam (now Y&R); N.W. Ayer (absorbed by Kaplan Thaler Group in 2002); Foote, Cone & Belding (now DraftFCB); McCann-Erickson.

1954 TV ad revenue moved ahead of magazines and radio. (TV didn't displace newspapers as the nation's largest ad medium until 1994.) TV household penetration passed the halfway point in 1954, with TVs in 55% of U.S. homes, up from just 0.4% in 1948.

1962 Discount chains swept the nation. Dime-store operator S.S. Kresge Co. opened Kmart. Rival F.W. Woolworth formed Woolco (closed in 1982). Dayton's, a Minneapolis department store, launched Target. Kohl's opened its doors. And Sam Walton, another five-and-dime retailer, started Walmart.

1975 Bill Gates and Paul Allen saw a cover story in Popular Electronics about the MITS Altair, a pioneering build-it-yourself computer kit, and they spotted an opportunity: Microcomputer hardware needs software. They started a company called Micro-Soft.

1983 Ameritech, one of AT&T's Baby Bell spinoffs, switches on the nation's first cellphone system in Chicago. The percentage of households owning wireless phones passed 50% in 2005, according to government data. Wireless-phone household penetration in 2009: 82%

1992 Starbucks, a Seattle-based chain of 165 coffee stores, completed its initial public offering. Today, Starbucks has 16,700 stores worldwide.

2004 Google, founded in 1998, held its initial public offering. Also in 2004: Harvard undergrad Mark Zuckerberg started Facebook as a place for his fellow students to connect.

Google market cap today -- $177 billion -- is more than the combined value of Disney, News Corp., Time Warner and Yahoo. Facebook is still private.

2010 The economy, consumer spending and ad market show signs of improvement. The job market continues to be weak. But the Great Recession of 2007-2009 -- the longest downturn since the Great Depression of the 1930s -- gives way to a modest recovery.