Tooheys, Nike, and Weet-Bix: The Work That Made Zac Pritchard

Zac is an Australian copy-based creative director. He’s been making ads for 10 years and enjoys creating things that are a little less conventional. Instead of just answering a brief, he prefers to solve the problem in an unexpected way.

Zac likes hot sauce, (most) sports, the ocean, dogs, his wife and son, water with bubbles in it, dad jokes, the feeling you get when you correctly guess a riddle and every single food item except quiche.

He’s worked at some incredible agencies and won some incredible awards, some of which resemble animals and some that resemble stationery.

LBB> The ad/music video from my childhood that stays with me…

​Zac> I remember watching Channel V’s ‘Dance Space’ and thinking all I wanted was to find my own invisible force field containing a dance floor in the middle of the street. I also remember thinking how good the casting was, each person was dancing exactly as you’d expect them to dance at a rave.

And I’ll never forget the Tooheys ‘Tongue’, obviously because of the song and the… you know, the detached tongue. It gives you the ick. You have a visceral reaction to a tongue barging through a house party but you just can’t stop watching. It left me wondering what my own tongue got up to at night.

LBB> The work that made me want to get into the industry…

Zac> After trying to figure out what on earth I wanted to do for the rest of my life, I went to study commercial radio, of all things. I later interned at one of the big commercial radio stations, writing ads for local businesses. And when all you write is radio ads, you end up listening to a lot of radio ads. I heard this one for Volkswagen and was so impressed with it, I looked into who was responsible. It was DDB. I wanted to make stuff like that. So off I went to find a job at an advertising agency.

LBB> The creative work that I keep revisiting…

​Zac> Nike - Last.​

I could wake up and watch this ad every day. It’s one of the lesser-known Nike spots, but in my opinion the best. It’s about an unlikely hero who comes last in a race, but still achieves something; the ability to call themselves a ‘runner’.

It makes me think I could be a marathon runner, because I’ve just learned that the guy who invented the marathon died, and I’m watching this person give it their all to make her own marathon happen. And the sign off: “You are not a runner, you are especially not a marathon runner, but at the end of this you will be”. Absolute poetic masterclass in writing. I’m going to watch it again right now. Hell, I might even try running again.

LBB> My first professional project…

Zac> My first agency experience was an unofficial, unpaid internship at a very small agency with the main clients being an industrial oven manufacturer, a tyre company and a condom brand, go figure. We received a 24-hour turnaround brief from the condom brand for a full-page print ad in Men’s Health Magazine. I frantically drew up 30 different ideas and lines and the CD chose this one. It was weird, but I was thrilled. I remember running to the supermarket to take a selfie with the magazine, a sentence you probably don’t hear much these days.

LBB> The piece of work that made me so angry that I vowed to never make anything like *that*…

​Zac> I don’t think a piece of work has made me so angry I’d never make anything like it, rather, I’ve seen a piece of work in market (a few times) that and thought to myself “damn, I’ve thought of an almost identical idea!” or “Gee whizz, wish we presented that one”, or my personal favourite, “if only the client bought that one”. I’m sure everyone has that feeling. It’s not anger. It’s not resentment. It’s just… A big sigh.

LBB> The piece of work that still makes me jealous…

​Zac> I wouldn’t say a piece of work has made me jealous, but there are certainly pieces of work made by people I’ve worked with that have inspired me to lift my game.

Take Josh Gross at Energy BBDO in Chicago and ‘Small Business Saturday’ for AMEX, which changed the course for many small businesses across America. Or Hugo Viega and Diego Machado at AKQA, who made ‘Real Beauty Sketches’ for Dove, the first of many pieces that changed the beauty category for the better.

There’s Ash Naidu and ReVoice for ALS Association, and Ant White for Hearing Test in Disguise, which both revolutionised the way brands can tackle issues around people’s health.

They’ve all made incredible pieces of work and raised the collective bar for creative advertising, which has indirectly motivated me to make brave, industry-defining work as well. Call that jealousy, call it inspiration, or just call it ‘hoping some of it rubs off’.

LBB> The creative project that changed my career…

​Zac> ‘The Riderless Bike’ was a big hill to climb, but the most rewarding downhill joyride I’ve ever had in advertising. We worked with former Australian cricket Captain, Steve Waugh, owner of the charity. We made an impressive piece of tech that we were told multiple times wasn't possible. We did it to actually help kids that needed help. And we managed to get some nice industry recognition along the way. It was quite a ride (various puns very, very intended).

LBB> The work that I’m proudest of…

​Zac> I feel like being proud of a piece of work happens when everyone else seems impressed by it. And by that definition, I would say three pieces of work come to mind for me.

I was proud of ‘Earnbassadors’ because it felt like much more than advertising. We paid people in Frequent Flyer points to make the ads for us. And they did. They made songs, music videos, clothes, animations, billboards, one guy even got a tattoo of the website on it. That’s pretty bloody impressive.

Then there was ‘Human Bait’, mainly because I’ve never felt more nervous presenting an idea before. We basically asked the CEO of SC Johnson Worldwide to sit in Rwanda, Africa in the dark and attract Malaria-laden mosquitoes for research to raise awareness about Malaria. And he loved it, which in itself is impressive.

Finally there’s ‘Coka Sans Sugar’, mainly because the process of finding 17 alphabets worth of typography in the fizz, bubbles and condensation of Coca-Cola was just really damn impressive. It took a long time, and a lot of crafting, but it was rolled out globally which felt really, really cool.

LBB> I was involved in this and it makes me cringe…

Zac> A long time ago I was an intern writer at one of the bigger agencies in Sydney, trying to do everything I possibly could to get noticed and hired. A TV commercial brief came in for Weet-Bix, and I did what all naive, junior creatives would have done. I wrote a manifesto.

But this manifesto was also a poem. And my voice also ended up as the voiceover. It was a bit (very) cliched and predictable, but the client absolutely loved it and it helped me get a job at the time.

I remember one of the agency partners turning to me after the client meeting and saying “We should probably hire you now”. So even though it was cringe, it at least helped me get a foot in the door.

LBB> The recent project I was involved in that excited me the most…

Zac> I’ve always loved work that actually solves a specific cultural or business problem. And our recent work for The ICONIC, an online fashion retailer, did exactly that. Nobody clicks on banner ads, especially banner ads for clothing that follow you around the Internet.

So we set up a shop and let people create their own look, jump into a banner-ad-sized-box and broadcast that look all over the Internet for other people to buy. It wasn’t just a cool idea, people genuinely loved it.

There was a queue out the door, a news crew came down and reported on it, and the results were super impressive. We got people actually clicking on banner ads. I know high-performing banner ads shouldn’t make me happy, but in this case it actually did.