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My first real boss after college was a cry baby. Randy Petrovakov spat tears when
summarizing The Talented Mr. Ripley, boo-hoo-ed about the marinara sauce at
Helen’s Restaurant, sobbed about his Lucky Jeans which he had hemmed religiously.
He cried when Dale Earnhart died, cried between kisses he planted on his dog, Gekko.
Randy’s tears and temper tantrums fueled his enthusiasm for his company, PLAYTIME.
Labeled a “creative agency,” PLAYTIME’s mantra and definition of creativity
was, “Look at more stuff and think about it harder.” The idea being, if you thought
hard enough about a salsa jar, you could re-invent its shape, its lid, its value in the culture
of marketing ... and the world. Everything was another jigsaw puzzle to be re-designed.
Anything could be re-invented. This was a dream job. Randy was named Entrepreneur
of the Year by Ernst and Young. Business Week plugged his formula.
As an employee of PLAYTIME, I was sucked into the vacuum of ‘re-inventing
business.’ “One day, you can write for us,” Randy said. “But first, you will answer the
phones.” Part shrink, part cult leader, part friend, part enemy, Randy’s gift was casting
spells. “What is your ONE WORD?” he asked us. He wanted a single word that
summed you up. It could be an emotion you were feeling at that very moment, a mood,
an attitude, a passion. Randy loved this exercise, asked all people about their ONE
WORD: “Talented! “Creative!” “Team-PLAYTIMEer!”
I bought into Randy’s contagious optimism, answering phones from a bar stool,
perched behind a modified round table with a welded front. I looked like a turret gunner.
With my wireless phone, alone in the front lobby, I stared out the window. I was
making a puny $20,000. Just enough for rent and bills. I made coffee, bought groceries
with the company credit card given to me in my name, ordered lunch for the guest clients,
and took out the trash. At any other business, I would have been called a secretary,
a receptionist, or a gopher. With Randy’s clever title, I was hip - “the team’s concierge.”
“You are part of our culture.” Randy said. “Clients are paying to see YOU, John.”
Every day I watched clients - World Famous Cola, The Disaster Channel, Grain-O
Cereals - dropped off at the front door by cabs from the airport. I welcomed them
with sidewalk-chalk art I created on the public cement, slumped down on my knees,
pouring out my best 12-year-old bubble letters: “WELCOME. LET’S PLAYTIME,”
as young twenty-somethings clicked their heels over and around me on the way to their
jobs where someone else answered the phones. “John, this isn’t brand loyal.” Randy
said pointing to my pink and yellow chalk lettering. I logged on to Staples and ordered
more sidewalk chalk in brand-appropriate colors. I sat on my bar stool and answered
phones, made coffee and did dishes. I watched as interns were promoted to the creative
team I was striving for. I waited for my big break.
PLAYTIME’S office was a reflection of Randy’s boyhood. His old, red Schwinn
bicycle, his Italian pogo stick, a handful of old metal toy cars and various board games
were stuck everywhere haphazardly. Comic books, Matchbox cars, viewfinders, and rubber
masks completed the scene. The idea was to create a different type of space to
help the client think differently. “We need to give the client a new type of space which
doesn’t feel like the office.” He put a ‘fart machine’ inside the bathroom and controlled
it via remote control. There was a loft with rainbow-colored pillows and bean bags. A
motorized garage door separated the meeting room from a glassed in phone booth. The
space was about creativity. Doodle away. Re-invent your brand. Re-invent yourself.
Polaroid cameras were tossed in the elevator. Licorice was set beside children’s stools
from IKEA. There was a go-cart in the hall. ‘Idea’ books, crayons, over-sized word
magnets ... anything that you supposedly could interact with for the next “BIG IDEA”
filled every corner of PLAYTIME. An idea could come from a flip flop’s design or the
song on the stereo.
Our PLAYTIME icon was a red rubber ball. We worked in a large, two story expansive
‘fun space’ with tiny partitions around the meeting room, in which thirty yoga balls
in a variety of sizes served as chairs. Randy was obsessed with these red rubber balls.
He installed a custom dispenser stocked with hundreds of balls. He carried a red rubber
ball onto every flight he took. He bounced it in airport bars and hotel lobbies. He
dribbled it during his public speeches. “Just look at that man’s face,” Randy enthused,
“when he sees that red rubber ball … he returns to his childhood.” Randy pointed his
fingers. “We need that same look in the business world. WHO’S WITH ME?”
Randy sent every client a red rubber ball in the mail, along with a photograph of the
team. It was my job to go desk to desk and have everyone sign the ball. If anyone was
not at work that day, I would forge the names. I used my left hand, tried more cursive,
or exaggerated my g’s and h’s, offered more curvature and flair. The most important clients
received a monstrous yoga ball just like the ones in the conference room. All balls
must be inflated, Randy demanded, before sent. I blew them up. Our electric pump
overheated, smoked, and broke. I had to resort to using the much slower bicycle pump.
I never could get the pump peg into the rubber ball valve. I was forced to buy KY Jelly,
which I kept on my desk.
Randy loved Fed-Ex. He discovered Tyvek - the white, indestructible material used
to ship documents - and went berserk with joy. “We need clothes made out of this,”
he barked. I searched it out, and ordered hundreds of tops and bottoms. When they
arrived, we converged downtown, bouncing red rubber balls and handing out branded
rubber bands. Some passersby were frightened of us. Others thought we looked foolish.
It made the paper, and Randy was satisfied. “THAT is how we do it. That’s a BIG
IDEA!”
After a year, Randy promoted me to the ‘Wallpaper Team.’ The Wallpaper Team
would cover everything: brand imaging, marketing, and re-development. Grain-O needed
new cereal ideas. U.S. Motors was launching a new car. Wooly Wooly wanted to walk
sheep down 5th Avenue to promote lightweight wool. We rushed to Toy-Tots and used
Randy’s “force-connection” idea: How can a Foamie Football help us with that new U.S.
car? Like a preacher, Randy reminded us, “There are no bad ideas.” After a couple of
beers his passion for creatively changing the world intensified. “WE CAN CHANGE
CORPORATE AMERICA!”
“Okay, where is that BIG IDEA coming from today?” Randy asked us one day.
I had no idea. “Okay, say we want to launch new male body washes. What if we had
eighteen year old girls in bikinis on street corners in major markets, and we ask men to
wash them with these new, male body washes?” I nibbled on the Sourdough Pretzels,
tired of the pressure. I began to laugh. Randy looked at me. He paused. A long pause.
He started crying. “God, I love you guys,” he wept. Then he looked straight at me.
“John? What is YOUR big idea today?”
“Food,” I said. I was hungry. I was also tired. I played in a band and often didn’t
get home until 3AM. I wanted breakfast. I wanted bacon. I wanted hash browns. I
wanted to write.
“I know you are hungry. I’m hungry, too … for a creative community. We all
are. So what’s your BIG IDEA, John?” he repeated, sitting on a gargantuan red yoga
ball, bouncing miniscule bops. In between the bounces, he couldn’t stop his loud, blubbering
tears.
I looked at Randy in his hemmed jeans. He looked half Serbian geek and half
sweaty salesman. I laughed. I said it.
“Look at more stuff, and think about it … harder.”
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