NEW YORK, NY--(Marketwired - May 23, 2013) - Ninety years after John Orr Young & Raymond Rubicam opened up Y&R with a single client, the agency is celebrating its 90 th year in business as one of the world's largest, iconic and most dynamic advertising agencies.
To commemorate this milestone and an industry Y&R has continually helped transform, the agency is inviting people around the world to post what advertising means to them in a social conversation that will culminate on an interactive digital billboard in one of the world's busiest crossroads, New York's Times Square, from 2 to 3:30 PM on May 23 rd .
"Our founder, Raymond Rubicam was fond of saying 'Our job is to Resist the Usual.' That's a great mandate, because it seeded an agency culture that values change, that is driven by creative ways of thinking and working. Our capacity to reinvent -- for our clients and for ourselves -- is one of the reasons we are among the very few agencies that have stood this test of time," said David Sable, Global CEO of Y&R.
To celebrate the anniversary, Y&R is partnering with one of the agency's Spark Plug startups, Hyperactivate, which has proprietary technology that captures the avatars from Twitter and Facebook and algorithmically creates a mosaic as people Tweet and post. Users can find their posts and others, as well as uncover hidden content as they interact with the mosaic. On May 23 rd , between the hours of 2 and 3:30 PM, the mosaic will populate on a major Clear Channel Spectacolor Billboard at NY's Times Square. People tweeting on the street will see their posts live on the billboard and the mosaic's image will be revealed.
States Sable: "Everything in the world is digital, but digital is not everything. The idea of taking this social conversation onto an amazing digital billboard is emblematic of the digital exponential world we live in, where we continually are bridging the digital and physical worlds. Where better to celebrate this convergence than in one of the world's most iconic locations?"
On Thursday, from 2 to 3:30 PM, the event will be live streamed on yr.com .
About Y&R Y&R is one of the leading global marketing communications companies. It is made up of the iconic Y&R Advertising agency; VML, one of the most highly regarded and fastest-growing digital agencies in the world; and iconmobile, one of the premier mobile marketing companies.
Y&R's founder, Raymond Rubicam, believed that the company's mission was to Resist the Usual on behalf of our clients. Today, that is kept alive by melding top-flight creativity with innovation to create new consumer experiences.
Y&R's largest agency, Y&R Advertising, has 186 offices in 90 countries around the world, with clients that include, Campbell's Soup Company, Colgate-Palmolive, Danone, Virgin Atlantic, Xerox, Revlon, GAP, Land Rover, and Telefonica, among many others.
About Hyperactivate.co m Hyperactivate is the marketing solutions company that creates participatory social media promotions to encourage and facilitate sharing of brand messages. Named one of the top three social media companies in 2013, Hyperactivate has a powerful platform for harnessing word-of-mouth marketing, analyzing social media efforts, and for the first time ever, accurately measuring social media ROI. The company is the first of its kind to develop a proprietary platform that can actually trace a brand revenue stream back to a single tweet or post and the chatter it created. Best known for its mosaic application, Hashtagart, Hyperactivate has now expanded its technology to a platform that includes a growing suite of products for activating fans & followers.
CONTACT: Jordana Altman Y&R Email Contact (O) 212-210-3715 (M) 914-413-8606
