A tribute to Hal Riney

I woke up this morning to an email from a friend notifying me that Hal Riney passed away. He died of cancer on Monday, March 24. He was 75. I was never formally introduced to Hal. He didn’t know who I was. But at one point in my life, my business cards had his advertising agency’s name on it. Right after grad school, I worked at Publicis & Hal Riney Advertising in San Francisco. I was an account planner, the person who uses research to help craft the advertising strategy. The advertising world just lost a legend.

Who was Hal Riney? First there was Howard Gossage, but then there was Hal Riney. Hal is credited with establishing San Francisco as a hotbed for great, creative advertising. He started out in the mailroom of BBDO San Francisco. Nine years later he was their creative director. In 1976, he moved to Ogilvy & Mather. He later opened his own shop and called it Hal Riney & Partners. He never forgot his roots. A huge picture of David Ogilvy hung next to his office. According to newspaper reports, former Hal Riney employees started no less than 28 advertising agencies. He mentored a generation of creative advertising talent.

Before Hal started catching national attention with his ads, most of the great creative advertising came out of New York or Chicago. Hal gave a Western flavor to advertising. Hal grew up in a small town in Washington state. He sprinkled images from his childhood into his ads: farm houses, pickup trucks, children holding American flags at 4th of July parades, wheat fields, men in overalls, and early morning sun rises. Many of his ads were wrapped in this ‘feel good Americana.’


Here is Hal's famous "It's Morning Again in America" spot for Ronald Reagan's 1984 presidential campaign. Hal is doing the voice-over in this ad.






Hal also wrote the Bartles and Jaymes Gallo wine cooler ads. Remember these two old men sitting on a porch?





How about those great Saturn ads about “A different kind of company. A different kind of car.”





Here is the best classic Saturn commercial available YouTube. Ya, ya, it is a Canadian Saturn ad, but with the same heartland values.




What was Hal like? By the time I worked at the agency (1999-2000), Hall was semi-retired. He worked on a few accounts, but he wasn’t very visible. Most of what I know about him comes from other employees and what I have read. (I have a huge file of newspaper articles about Hal and his agency that I started collecting even before I worked at Riney.)

So what did other say of him? He was old and crotchety. Hal and I once almost bumped into each other when I accidentally took the service stairs out of the building. I found out later that those service stairs were off limits to employees. He liked to come and go without seeing people. He actually didn’t like to be bothered with his employees. He once made a joke at a holiday party that he used the annual party to see (not know) the people that worked for him.

He was a copywriter, an old school copywriter. I have read many a story about Hal writing copy at his typewriter with a cigarette hanging out of his mouth and a little bourbon at his side to keep the creative juices flowing. It is hard to imagine this happening in an ad agency now. Wait. Back up. I guess it depends on the agency.

To Hal, it was all about the creative work---not client relations, not the media plan, not the research. This emphasis was on the creative aspect of advertising which explains why the creative department ran the agency. I remember we had to struggle to keep account planning (research) active in each account. Research wasn’t really appreciated. There was even rumor that he didn’t even know what account planning was. (Account planning started in the UK. The concept started making its way to US agencies about 15 years ago.) I think he did know, but chose not to remember because to him, good ads were based on gut and intuition, not research.


He also had a reputation of hating technology. For example, he did not allow agency employees to have voice mail! If we were not at our desks, two older ladies (who had been with Hal Riney for many, many years) answered our phones and gave us messages on cute little pink notes. Hal did this because he did not want clients and agency executives interacting via recorded messages. He wanted his people to talk directly with clients.

The opportunity to talk directly with agency people was a blessing to me when I was looking for a job. After sending my resume, I left countless voice messages at all of the ad agencies in San Francisco. Of course, nobody returned my call. However, at Hal Riney, the director of account planning actually answered his phone and I got to talk to him personally! This is how I got my first interview, which eventually led to a job.


Hal’s advertising style resonates with me. I grew up in Hal’s America. It was “Morning in America’ everyday in my little home town on the eastern plains of Colorado. His ads captured the good side of grown up in small town USA: the community, the work ethic, the wholesomeness. I know all about this and the emotional power of these images.



I am saddened by his passing and that it was cancer that took his life. Hal wouldn’t like this cliché, but I think he is still cranking out great copy on his Underwood typewriter in his soft-focused, romantic version of America.