A Newspaper Clipping Saves the Day

The original Mac, launched on January 24, 1984, looks hopelessly quaint, boxy and uninspired by today’s standards.  

But at that time it was a truly remarkable and innovative feat of integrated engineering -- in software, hardware and packaging. It was the first personal computer with a graphical user interface and a mouse, and it was smaller than the big clunkers the competition was selling. It redefined how people could use computers. It opened the door for non-computer users to use their first computer. It was called “the computer for the rest of us.”  

And millions and millions should have immediately flown off the shelves.

This is where George Lucas, C-3PO and Star Wars enter the picture. The first Star Wars movie came out in 1977. It was an immediate, huge hit. And upon it a great franchise was built.

One morning in 1983 Steve was looking for me and we bumped into each other in a hallway. He pulled out of his pocket a rumpled newspaper clipping from yesterday’s paper. It told of how George Lucas wanted to make the original Stars Wars movie appear to be an instantaneous huge social phenomenon the moment it was released to theaters.  

This perception would co-opt the objectivity of the general public, thus propelling them by the millions to go see Star Wars. Everyone would be talking about it. No one would want to be left out in the cold. And Star Wars would become a huge hit. This was a crazy new idea in the art of creating a brand.

Lucas was brilliant in this regard. Far in advance of the movie’s premiere, he arranged for toy and clothing manufacturers to "bet on the come" and design and produce all kinds of Star Wars paraphernalia that would appeal to kids and their parents. It was a bold, untested gamble. And it worked exceptionally well. When the movie came out in 1977 the market was simultaneously flooded with all things Star Wars. And another virtuous cycle was started. Which came first, the chicken or the egg – the movie or the toys? It simply didn’t matter. The general consensus was that Star Wars was huge because these toy companies wouldn’t be building and selling toys if it wasn’t huge. Objectivity flew out the window and Star Wars conquered all.

I quickly read the article and Steve and I just looked at each other and nodded. We got it -- completely. We would use this Star Wars marketing scheme for our launch strategy. No one in the computer industry had every contemplated such a thought. Computers had yet to be perceived as a consumer-oriented purchase.

Steve gets all the credit for this one. And an assist goes to George Lucas and C-3PO.

But we weren’t a fun new movie with a $3.00 ticket price (average price in the early 1980s), or a $2.49 action figure.  

We were a $2,495 computer. Was there an analog of Lucas’s “toys and trinkets” that could work effectively for us? What could we do, far in advance that would create the impression at time of Mac’s launch that it was already successful? Could we create a social phenomenon causing many people to buy a Mac simply because they thought everyone else was? Could we overcome the IBM FUD factor (see Mac Story #9)? 

And could we get away with it?

Today Apple is credited with creating "Event Marketing" in the technology sector. This is true -- but the launch event for a new product, with its scripted fun and suspense, rigged PR, up-volume rock and roll, etc. was just the most visible part of the overall comprehensive launch plan. It's the tip of the iceberg. A large successful event, even with great press coverage, amounts to nothing if (1) the product isn't great and (2) the market doesn't believe you.

In the Mac marketing team we already had many different market development activities in the works. We had assembled a team of highly productive, creative and resourceful thinkers and doers. But now we saw the power of bringing all their work together into an integrated whole and leveraging the impact. We wouldn’t just announce the availability of the Mac in January 1984, we would create the impression that the Mac was already here and was already being used by people you’d like to emulate. We wanted you to ask yourself, "Why don't I already know about this?" and then feel obligated to investigate and hopefully purchase. The Mac eco-system wouldn't be a product of Darwinian evolution. Instead it would instantly appear -- ex nihilo (out of nothing).

The most important pieces to this puzzle included: Lots of third party software and some hardware peripherals; the invention and secret funding of MacWorld Magazine (with David Bunnell and Andrew Flugelman); the Apple University Consortium (with Johanna Hoffman and Dan’l Lewin sharing Oscars for this); the Public Relations campaign directed by Regis McKenna (with Andy Cunningham, Jane Anderson and many more) that would create “news” versus “public relations” in all national media, and the bold advertising campaign directed by Chiat-Day (with Lee Clow, Steve Hayden and many more) in Los Angeles that would put the word “Macintosh” into the common lexicon while also creating a huge ease-of-use gap between the Mac and all older generation PCs.

About this same time I also hired two Washington DC political consultants to help me think through all of this. I had to make sure I was understanding the entire space from all possible dimensions and perspectives. Big political campaigns are very instructive because the results are completely binary – either you win or you lose. 49.9% of the votes is the same as 1%. You lose. The stakes are enormous. What could we learn and apply from the strategy of presidential political campaigns in the early 1980s?

From these consultants, Pat Caddell and  Scott Miller, I learned two great axioms that have proven the test of time: 

(1) In a fiercely fought battle where the stakes are high, and you are the insurgent, you must CONTROL THE DIALOGUE; and 

(2) EVERYTHING COMMUNICATES (your public speeches, the way the receptionist answers the phone, the “how to” instructions inside the box, the graphic design on the side of the box, the tonality of the advertising, the way you treat your competitors, the way you treat each other, etc.) – add it all up and the sum becomes your brand.

The launch of the Mac on January 24, 1984 – including the famous Super Bowl 1984 TV commercial – has been accurately covered in so manyarticles, books, documentaries and commercial movies. I won't cover it in this post.

But behind the scenes we were crossing our fingers. January 24th was a homerun. No if ands or buts about it -- we nailed it. The more important question was: What would January 25 be like? Would the world, hungover from a great Mac party, go back to work and be satisfied using IBM PCs? Or would we have succeeded in establishing a small beachhead upon which we could kick and claw our way up the steep cliff and invade, via computer dealerships and more advertising, hundreds of hamlets and townships and multi-national corporations?

To our wonderful relief, we woke up on the 25th and found ourselves solidly not only on the beach but already up and over the cliff. We were on our way.

Thanks George Lucas, C-3PO and all things Star Wars. That trivial little newspaper clipping changed everything and proved to be of great value to us!