How David Ogilvy Grew an Agency on One Unfashionable Idea
On September 23, 1948, David Ogilvy opened an agency with four small accounts and, by his own account, no copywriting experience. His idea that advertising must sell took it to third in the world.
On September 23, 1948, David Ogilvy opened a New York advertising agency on Madison Avenue under the name Hewitt, Ogilvy, Benson & Mather. Two London firms, Mather & Crowther and S.H. Benson, gave it four clients with small budgets and little recognition in the United States: Wedgwood China, British South African Airways, Guinness, and Bovril. Ogilvy had left Oxford without a degree, worked as a kitchen hand at the Hotel Majestic in Paris, sold AGA cooking stoves door to door, run research for George Gallup's Audience Research Institute, served with British Intelligence at the British Embassy in Washington, and farmed in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania. By his own later account, he had never written any copy.
