Former ad man Alex Bogusky still going to extremes.

• Author: Sukin, Gigi
• Position: GOOD COMPANY - Interview

Alex Bogusky joined Miami-based ad agency Crispin and Porter as art director in 1989, but he never saw himself as a "lifer" anywhere. He added his surname to the agency's nameplate in less than a decade and racked up industry accolades, awards and an affinity for outszde-the-box campaigns. But in October 2010, Bogusky announced via Twitter he would be leaving his self-created post as "Chief Insurgent Officer" at CP+B's holding company, MDC Partners, to pursue new ventures.

ColoradoBiz sat down with the 51-year-old Bogusky to catch up on his post-CB+B life.

CB: You're the son of two designers: a studio owner dad and magazine art director mom. So, did you color more than the average child?

AB: The thing is, if you're the son of a cobbler, you don't want to be a cobbler. So I don't think I was attracted to it. [Design] was sort of a fallback. Professional motocross didn't work and it was like, well I could always do that thing.

How did it go from a "fallback" to you eventually earning the nickname of "Advertising's Elvis?"

I started working in design at my dad's studio and I liked it. When he got sick I took over--I was 24 at the time. And one of my clients was Chuck Porter. He used our studio for design.

The best thing that happened to me was the realization that I could just outwork everybody.

[A few years later] I decided I had to get out of print because there'd be no such thing as a print designer within the next year or two. And I thought I've got to learn television. And who did I know who worked in television? Oh, Chuck Porter.

And at that point, Crispin and Porter wasn't a big, national agency. Was there a game-changing moment?

The 'Truth' campaign was a really significant win. That was the anti-tobacco campaign.

Our research showed that if you told kids not to smoke, they would because the whole point of smoking was to take control of your life. That was troubling, because we didn't want to be part of making it worse. Later we developed a strategy to take that rebellion that's a natural part of that age and turn it against the industry. The epidemiologists said this will never work. I remember being in this room surrounded by scientists and they're like. 'How do you know it will work?' and I said, 'We don't, but we know what you're doing now is backfiring.'

And that series of ads went on to become one of the most successful social marketing campaigns of the time. From there you had a run at the Land Rover account. What went wrong?

I...