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I'M.... MICHAEL BARBARO...AND THIS...IS THE DAILY
This past summer I was thrilled to be invited back to Gretel to work on the flagship campaign for the New York Times’ podcast, “The Daily”. Hosted by Michael Barbaro, “The Daily” has five million monthly unique listeners, and it became the most-downloaded new show in 2017 on Apple Podcasts, airing on more than 30 radio stations across the country. Sam Dolnick, assistant managing editor, now calls it “the new front page.”
The Times commissioned Gretel to help grow the audience and celebrate the uniqueness of the show to untapped listeners. We needed to articulate the importance and relevance of the show in a succinct, memorable and non-partisan way. We developed a verbal and visual language, which threads the immediacy of the medium with the mission of the Times. The campaign ran nationally, with executions that spanned OOH, TV, radio, print and digital – all built around a single line: “This moment deserves to be understood.”
I worked closely with my Gretel BFFs ECD Ryan Moore, Art Director Caleb Halter, and Producer Kerry Griner. My role was primarily as Creative Director of the TV spots, as well as helping pull imagery from the Times' archive and pair it with our copy lines for the extensive print and OOH portions of the campaign.
Having grown up with the Times as the paper of record in my household, I was beyond thrilled to step into the mothership. I even took a pic of my security badge and sent it to my parents (!).
Seeing how the podcast comes together in real time was truly fascinating. Michael and his staff were still throwing around topics at lunchtime for the show due the very next day. Once Michael had chosen a topic, he quickly rattled off some relevant Times articles on the subject from memory, and threw out a few names of reporters he thought were deeply informed on the subject and b) actually already in the building that day. He needed them to come into the booth and have an unrehearsed, candid conversation, on tape.
The producers were off and running. They secured the featured guest and started recording later that afternoon. They began editing it late that night. The whole thing is uploaded to their London office around 10pm for final audio polishing before going live at 6am EST. Amazing.