RUNNING A BROADCAST CAMPAIGN

Working withe an ad agency is always a great learning experience for any marketer. And through my career I have been able to work with some great agencies. There is one in particular that I did want to highlight, mainly because this was an agency I help land from the beginning to end and also fully managed the relationship. Over the past years, I have had the pleasure and good fortune to work with the nation's largest Hispanic run agency, Lopez Negrete Communications (LNC). In the relationship I oversaw everything from concept to completion, the creative process, budgeting, production, copywriting process, etc. Working with senior leadership, senior writers, audio engineers, producers and directors, and one of the best relationship managers I have seen in the field. Here I learned what it not only means to build a broadcast ad campaign from the ground up but also how to budget for one and maintain and deliver on it. Once the deal was done, we got paired up with the best and brightest within the company and for the next three to four years, we would make some great commercials and tell the story of the Astros experience and the promotions that came with those experiences. 

BEING A COOK IN THE KITCHEN

Below are some of the behind-the-scenes shots from early morning drone shots to late night food stylist shots. Alex Lopez Negrete considered me a "cook in the kitchen" which meant we established a unique, custom type of relationship that allowed me to go into the studio, not only after the process but during the creation, serving as a team creative director and co-editor. Not only was I project planning a years worth of media but also helpling direct and produce some commercials in one of the most state-of-the-art studios I have seen in the game. This shop spared no expense, giving us full access to their award winning Zap Boom Bang studio and award winning creators. A true partnership I am still very proud of until this day because they were willing to build a custom package that fit ours needs and my desires to integrate the Astros marketing and creative team into this next level of advertising with one of the nation's best. 

Voice-Over Talent 

Casting from over 10 nationwide voice actors, we were able to secure the perfect voice for our brand and our current campaign. We were looking for someone who had grit, maturity, and a hint of rasp. Our VO talent search was just part of the challenge - now you have to onboard them to your campaign story and voice coach them into an authentic storyteller. Once your in the recording studio, time is literally money (billable hours) so we had to be extremely efficient - starting promptly and ending on time. And when you're laying down the voice of your commercial, there are many aspects to consider pace, attitude, cadence and emphasis - some call this PACE for short. Ultimately, all this happens in real-time during the studio session and there are massive amounts of accountability and dollars on the line to get this right. No pressure. 

Sound Effects & Mixing

Music and sound effects are just as essential as finding the right voice for your campaign. We worked with one of LNC's best audio engineers to master our sound. Working side by side, we were able to bring just the right amount of heroic music to our campaign and accompanying every spot with custom sound effects for pretty much every single camera shot/scene. Our media flight called for 12 spots for both TV and radio (24 total) and as always, when building out a campaign, one of the challenges you'll be faced with is that the audio bed for a TV commercial will not suffice for a radio broadcast. So we had to go in and customized each radio spot - well, they did - I was just a "cook in the kitchen" and was responsible for making the essential on-the-fly calls when needed also offering creative solutions serving as the expert of our brand story and leader of our campaign vision. 

ASTROS // CREATIVE DIRECTION // Chris David Garcia
ASTROS // PROJECT MANAGEMENT // Chris David Garcia
ASTROS // CAMPAIGN TEAM // Astros Marketing Team
AGENCY // ACCOUNT MANAGER // Sonny Villarreal
AGENCY // EXEC PRODUCER // Alvaro Hernandez
AGENCY // SENIOR COPYWRITER // Doug Klein
AGENCY // Lopez Negrete Communications
STUDIO // Zap Boom Bang