Stan Richards Speaks to Texas Advertising Students

On November 2nd, Stan Richards - founder and CEO of the Richards Group in Dallas --visited UT. He spoke to a full house over-flowing with students curious as to what he had to say. He started at the beginning. Giving the audience a short history of The Richards Group, its incredible growth to become the largest independent advertising agency in the USA and he proudly listed several of the awards that his agency had recently won.

The agency reel is nothing short of sensational; Stan described the success of the Home Depot account, how the agency brought Corona out of the import beer dumps to be a brand leader and he talked about the conception and success of major national campaigns the agency has launched like the Motel 6 and Chick-Fil-A campaigns. (If you haven't, check out http://www.lamaroutdoor.com/outdoorfiles/Content/ChickFilA.pdf -- it's really good.)

Of the over 200 hundred students in the room a number of them sent in questions ahead of time for Mr. Richards. They ranged anywhere from describing account planning's role in the creative process at Richards to what's so great about Dallas compared to Chicago or New York. In the end Mr. Richards brought his expertise, experience and infectious passion to the students at UT. It was a priceless opportunity to meet a thought leader and icon in our industry.

Thanks to the 200+ the students who were in attendance on Friday and special thanks to all of those who submitted questions. It made for a lively and more intimate discussion.

We'd also like to extend our thanks to Professor Burns for arranging the event and to Sean Thompson and Dale Austin for designing and distributing the invitational poster.

Keep your eyes and ears open for the next speaker in the Thought Leadership Lecture Series this December.

11/12/2007