That memorable day when Michael Jackson's hair caught light during the filming of a Pepsi ad is just one of the incidents recounted in Phil Dusenberry's enormously entertaining memoir. A BBDO lifer, Dusenberry joined the company in 1962 as a copywriter and rose steadily through the ranks, ultimately becoming chairman of BBDO North America until his retirement in 2002. He played a significant role in elevating the business into a position as America's foremost creative agency. On his watch, BBDO invented General Electric's "We bring the good things to life" slogan, and "The best a man can get" for Gillette, managed Ronald Reagan's landslide 1984 re-election campaign, boosted Visa, Pizza Hut and FedEx among many others, and conceived the post-9/11 I Love New York campaign. As point man on BBDO's Pepsi account, Dusenberry played a major part in the elevation of the #2 soft drink into a viable rival to Coca-Cola's crown, not least through the execution of the famed Pepsi Challenge taste test. Michael Jackson's hair-on-fire episode was merely the appalling punchline to a grinding series of negotiations which began when Jackson agreed to accept $5m to appear in the ad, but only on condition that his face was never shown. Dusenberry touches on all these moments and more, but also takes the time to discuss the more sober realities of running a major agency, and the truth behind the over-glamorized image of the industry. 

In the process, he manages to combine amusing anecdotes with a thoughtful and practical analysis of the rules for successful marketing. One of the most instructive of these is his belief that the greatest compliment an ad executive can ever receive is not 'That's a great ad' but 'That's insightful'. An insight, he says, "states a truth that alters how you see the world". "Ideas are a dime a dozen; anyone can have them... Insight is rarer, and infinitely more precious. In the advertising business, a good idea can inspire a great commercial. But a good insight can fuel a thousand ideas, a thousand commercials." If the book has a weakness it is that Dusenberry doesn't in any way address the current challenges within the industry posed by the growing dominance of the internet. But the underlying truth about advertising arguably remains unchanged, whatever the medium of delivery. Certainly, Dusenberry's book has few rivals as the definitive account of life in the fast lane of the advertising business in its golden period between 1980 and 2000. 

Added 17th November 2005