The world (or at least 320x240 pixels of it) is my canvas

Today was a pretty cool day. It was a normal day all the way up until around 11am when Glen came to me with a little task. Hopefully telling you all about this little task won't land me in any trouble for telling the "world" about it..but here goes.

As some of you already know, The Agency is currently in the middle of a new business pitch for Michelin Tires. The final presentation for the account is tomorrow (6/22), so today was a pretty crazy day for lots of people at Martin. The pitch team came up with a neat idea to add to their presentation tomorrow: Since Merchant's Tire and Auto Centers are probably the biggest reseller of Michelin tires, they thought it would be a neat idea to have Palm devices in the Merchant's stores with an interactive tire-buying guide and specifications and details about the tires. It makes sense, though. Think about the last time you went into a tire place. Half of the people don't have all of their teeth, and sometimes it's hard to find someone that will give you the cold, hard facts about the tires that you're interested in purchasing. So, why not have these little devices tethered to the front counter and let people find out tires exactly how Michelin would want them to learn about them. So, how does this involve me? Well, Glen volunteered me to come up with a demonstration website that would run on his iPaq PocketPC for the pitch tomorrow. No pressure or anything.

So, I spent the entire rest of the day designing an entire website (at 320x240) for the final presentation tomorrow. The site consisted of two basic parts: a tire Buying Guide and a listing of all of the tires that they sell, complete with pictures, specs, etc. The tire buying guide would ask for the make and model of your vehicle, what driving conditions you have, and then recommend the right tires for your vehicle. Obviously, I didn't have enough time to make this actually work..but I made it appear to work. Pretty cool.

But here's the absolute best part: When it was close to being completed, Glen and I took it upstairs to show the account team, including John Adams, our CEO. When we got up there, Glen handed John the iPaq and after John figured out how to turn it on (DOH!), he went crazy. I can't even put into words how excited he was that we had taken his "crazy" idea and actually made it work. He was sitting there, surfing the site I had just built and stomping his feat on the floor like a little kid. He was seriously giddy. And when he was done, he looked at Glen and I, told us that it was "Fabulous" and high-fived us both. And that, my friends, was the absolute most gratifying feeling I've had since I've been at Martin. What a great feeling..to make your CEO giddy from your efforts and tell you face-to-face what a kick ass job you did.

I went back down to my desk and tweaked the rest of the site-let for the rest of the day with a huge smile on my face and an excited feeling in my stomach. They'll take the iPaq with them tomorrow and show it to the Michelin folks. I can't wait to hear if we won or not. I sure hope so. That would make this an even sweeter day.

Have a wonderful Friday, everybody.

Posted by Jeff at June 21, 2001 11:14 PM