Quaker City Mercantile (formerly known as Gyro Worldwide) goes beyond traditional ads with its own clothing line and DVD series.
12/01/2003

Steven Grasse, founder of Philadelphia's brand architecture firm Quaker City Mercantile, knows how to throw a good party. His, in fact, have brought chandeliers-from which rowdy partygoers have swung riotously-crashing to the floor. "We're probably more heavily insured than your average ad agency," says Grasse, tongue only partially planted in cheek. But these are parties with a purpose. In one swoop, Quaker City Mercantile (formerly known as Gyro Worldwide) transforms a brand essence into three dimensions. In the process, he reaches the people who insist vehemently that they're just too hip to reach. It has a lot to do with showmanship-freak-showmanship or otherwise-and controversy: A 1993 print ad for a local tattoo store, for example, featured Charles Manson: "Everyone has the occasional urge to go wild and do something totally outrageous." Reflecting a passion for paradox, his clients range from sweets to sins, with M&M/Mars on the one hand, R.J. Reynolds on the other, and the Republican Party (that's right) lodged somewhere in between. As if that weren't enough, he's also the man behind the "B-Movie epic," Bikini Bandits, an experience that has been described as "like watching a Russ Meyer flick while thumbing through Maxim and spraying cheese whiz down your throat." These efforts seemed to warrant a conversation, so one caught up with Grasse to talk about his 3D approach to marketing.

Showmanship.

We do a lot of research and we're finding that people don't watch TV or read magazines anymore. So where are they? They're out doing things. If they're out, you want to get them involved and experiencing the brand. What we're really good at is being honest. It's not "stealth marketing." We don't pretend that it's not about the brand. We're inviting you to come out and celebrate the garish commercialism of it. Partake in our consumerism. They get mad if you try to pretend the party's not sponsored. Because then they've been tricked. We learned that a long time ago.

In this age of 300 TV channels and short attention spans, an event communicates on a sustained level. And we understand strategic marketing. Most event firms don't understand strategy and how to tie it all together. You take brands that spend all this money developing advertising, and bring that brand essence to life. But you have to make it fun. You need to be a good showman. Everyone knows the free beer comes at a price, and the price is being sold to. The question is, are you going to be sold like a Tupperware party or is it going to be like PT Barnum, where it's totally engaging and fun? It can be fun in a cheesy way.

The Diesel event [a grand opening party with a mini boxing ring and boxers who performed an exhibition match] was hilarious. And circus-y. We also did a freak show for Diesel. We know how to do freak shows. Part of it is that we need brands that get it. We also tend to work with clients where other avenues are shut off, because of government restrictions. So everything can be born out of necessity, but eventually it will be a standard part of people's marketing plan. It's almost like saying we're not going to have a Web site. Everybody has a Web site now.

Proof is in the paradox.

Paradox is my own personal pleasure. It also fits well with the demographic we reach. We've had focus groups, and in group after group hipsters say they can't be marketed to. Then they come to a marketing event and are sold to. The Republican National Committee approached us to put something together that would help the Party reach a younger crowd. We threw a party called Shock the Vote. I think they got more than they bargained for. Senators were walking around with mouths open, like, "Oh my God." We had a series of fundraisers. One was at a strip club.

The crowd was an odd mix of young Republicans, who are squeaky clean. Then we got all the tattoo-ed guys. It was a very subversive party. The funniest part was meeting with George Bush's people. I kept thinking, I wish I had this on camera. They were so straight laced. And we're not. We're Marilyn Manson Republicans. The client knew the party achieved what it set out to do but it was a little too wild for them. I absolutely agree that it was. It was a blast. It got lots of press coverage. But it took them two years to call me to talk about Ted Nugent, who wants to run for the Governor of Michigan. He's got an interesting problem, because you'd have to get young people who are probably a little scared of his views, so you'd actually have to pull back a little.

The goal was to answer the question: Can the Republicans do something remotely cool? We showed that they could. Are they smart enough to follow it up? Probably not. Am I eager to follow it up? Not really, because I got a bad taste in my mouth from politics. It's not really fun. It's a lot of boring white guys. But the party was fun. The most outrageous thing we could think of was to work with them on this. I don't think they put enough into it as a sustained effort. I'd love to see them turn it into a Rock the Vote sort of thing. The Republicans need something so that their side of the story is told.

In all seriousness.

At the heart of it we're a design-centered agency. And we put that above everything else except strategy. As far as controversy, I have a strong view on the world and put it out there in a way that tends to be ironic and satirical, and that surfaces in our work. But some of our work is very serious. Each client has their own set of rules. The Republican thing, we were kind of making fun of it. R.J. Reynolds or M&M/Mars we take deadly seriously. There's no joking around with that at all. The stuff we're known for is the crazy stuff. But a lot of the cigarette stuff and liquor stuff is serious. The work we do for Puma isn't outrageous. Some of it's groovy and some of it is stylish. One of the most interesting things we've done was for Puma during the World Cup. We hired the Iron Chef on the Food Network to create a sushi roll for Puma, which we put on the menu in top sushi restaurants in the world. We threw parties in London, Tokyo, and New York. It was classy, and an interesting way to promote the World Cup.

Brand partner.

We're launching our own rum in the UK in February. We started the Sailor Jerry clothing line, then licensed the rights to the name and artwork to William Grant. But we market the rum through the clothing company. We're going to open a Sailor Jerry shop in London to sell the clothing, but it will also be a tattoo parlor and a bar. You can wear the clothing, get the tattoo, and drink the rum. What's great is not only do we get paid as the ad agency, but also we get paid in the bottles sold. That's where the future is-when the agency has a stake in the intellectual property that they create. We're not just the agency, we're the owner of the brand, we're the partner of the brand as well.

G-Mart is our retail laboratory, which started because we wanted to see how our clients' brands worked in a retail environment. We sell cigarettes, we sell Puma.

I can tell Puma which styles are selling and which aren't. It's not theoretical, which is the way 99% of agencies work. In all eight of our Bikini Bandit films, which have had 8 million viewers, G-Mart plays a central role in the plot. That translates to 8 million G-Mart fans. We realized that beyond a laboratory for our clients, we could sell G-Mart retail. Suddenly, G-Mart, this tiny little store, has a much bigger presence than it warrants.

We're taking the G-Mart line wholesale in February. Sailor Jerry sells in 3,000 stores around the world and the G-Mart line will be piped into those accounts. Anyone can build a brand if they're given $1 million but the G-Mart brand was built on guerrilla. I've been able to build these brands that truly resonate with our core consumer. I can go into a client and say I know guerrilla marketing because I've done it for myself. Sometimes the things you're shy with on your paid clients you can try on yourself and if it works over there you can say, hey, we can try it over here.

---

Quaker City Mercantile's (formerly Quaker City Mercantile's) Scope