Work From Heart Episode 1: Marc Garbarini, Far From Timid's Executive Creative Director
This week we interviewed Marc Garbarini, Far From Timid's Executive Creative Director. Send us a note with answers to our WFH questions below and get featured on our site. 💌
Your quarantine tagline?
“Tell everyone that matters you love them.”
Creative skills you’ve sharpened?
“Connecting. Like everyone, collaborating virtually has become THE new skillset.”
Other skills you’ve sharpened?
“Design. Working with start-ups who need a brand that differentiates compels me to consume the space and to create a language that people want to engage with. Also, and I know it’s weird – email templates. Wrapping my head around the art and science of them.”
Biggest professional or personal aha moment?
“Less of an “Aha” because I’ve lived by it – the technology is enough of a filter so you need to give more. More energy, more humor, more encouragement, asking better questions, and sharing more of my emotions.”
Biggest opportunity for brands?
“To know their customers better. Full stop. Anyone who has worked with me or any of my students, I’m like a broken record – WHO are you talking too? Take this moment, press pause, put together a testing/research strategy and answer the question. Thoroughly. Intimately. Your customer today IS the opportunity.”
Has your creative process changed since working from home?
“Not too much. I mean it’s lonelier for sure which I struggle with, so much of the goodness of what we do is the input and encouragement we get from other people on the team.”
You also teach, what are students thinking about, most worried or excited about as they think about their future?
“I just wrapped our Spring quarter at Miami Ad School – held virtually and was amazed at how well it went. This group of students were voracious, talented. They’re all incredibly invested in racial equality, they wanted to understand what might be asked of them at agencies in order to push the agenda forwards. Organizations MUST create the room for this next generation to contribute, to lead, to advocate, and to be heard. If they don’t …”
If there were a 911 hotline for brand emergencies, what would the majority of calls entail this week?
“#DeleteFacebook, #BoycottFacebook, #StopHateForProfit, #F**kTheZuck … yes?”
What’s your quarantine summer drink?
“My mom is from Provence, spent many summers there. Traditionally my uncles chose Pastis and aunts drank Rosé. Ladies always have better tastes, not surprisingly mine is Rosé too … from Provence, of course.”
What kind of filter do you think brands need to have when marketing amidst our profound cultural shifts of dealing with a pandemic and racial equality?
"Each shift is unique. One is a long overdue injustice being resolved in real time. The other, a burden we hope will melt into memory. For both I'd recommend the following, if you cannot create a brand utility that helps to progress and help the human plight, don't jump into an echo chamber."
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