Last night, Traction celebrated our 10th birthday. Hands down, the craziest party we've thrown. How could it not be with all the Tractionistas past and present, together with the Extra Action Marching Band thrown in for good measure (they were so sexy it was ridiculous)?

In the word's of Gabriel, "This is how we roll."

Last Thursday Traction had a visit from Pete Slosberg and Mark "Rhino" Bronder, the co-founders of Pete's Wicked Ales. They came by for a Traction Reaction, a speaker series we have where we invite interested people by the agency to talk about whatever they feel like talking about. It's always informative and always fun. Mark and Pete didn't disappoint on either account. 

Pete told us the story of how they built Pete's Wicked from a idea into the #2 beer in the microbrew category. It was an impressive story. Here are some of the lessons learned.

At Traction we believe that "everything is interactive." Taking that to heart, the creative team had some old-school interactive fun, inspired by Adam Kleinberg's SXSW presentation: "7 reasons why your employees hate you." Pretending that our boss was an evil tyrant, we xeroxed photos of Adam and took turns defacing enhancing them with a variety of mediums such as ink, pencil, and collage. Imaginary retribution never felt this good.

Finally...someone cuts through the social media buzz and reveals our deeper motivations.

(Courtesy of Despair, Inc.)

On Thursday February 17th, 2011 at 14:30 hours, Traction hosted its very own Battledecks competition. (Part of our Learning Phase series.) For luddites unfamiliar with the game made popular at SXSW, "Battledecks is a fast-paced blood sport involving Keynote slides the contestants have never seen before. Each contestant has to get through the most devastating, despair-ridden, filthy slides ever projected within a confined space."* Sounds fun, right?

I have always wanted my own unicorn and thanks to the makers of the game, I now have a digital one. What makes it even more special? The fact that it has fairies, stars and dolphins in it. (that’s right, I said dolphins. What do they have to do with unicorns? Abso-fuckin’-lutely nothing! Which is why it’s so brilliant).

I remember the time when I was first introduced to Mr. Potter. It was dark and he was about 10 feet tall even though he was just a boy. That first Harry Potter movie changed everything (relatively speaking of course). Here was a boy who was living life surrounded by something I had always craved—magic. Of course Potter-mania was already in full swing by then, but I had discarded the entire Potter epidemic as children's fluff. Little did I know that this boy would become an icon and defeat "He who must not be named"!

Agencies develop a wealth of concepts and ideas that often never make it over the finish-line for a variety of reasons: internal politics, budget constraints, shifting strategies or aesthetic differences. Sometimes the lost ideas aren't worth crying over, but sometimes some real brilliance hits the cutting room floor.

Instead of letting these concepts gather dust and fade into forgotten obscurity; we occasionally like to parade them around to make ourselves feel better.

You're sick of the holidays, aren't you? Awkward holiday parties. Long lines. Commercialism? That's ok. We understand. That's why there's Grouchmas, the holiday for those who've forgotten the meaning of merry.

Glazed doughnut sandwiched between two apple fritters.

Best served on the morning after a big holiday party.