Episode
38

Trust the mad men

Published on:
Dec 3, 2025
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1:08:45
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In this episode of High Agency, we sit down with Frank Palmer, the legendary Canadian ad man who reshaped the country’s creative landscape. From his humble beginnings in Vancouver to building Palmer Jarvis into Canada’s most creatively acclaimed agency, Frank’s 50-year career is a masterclass in vision, grit, and unapologetic originality. As the architect behind the merger that formed DDB Canada, he transformed a local shop into a national creative powerhouse known for the country’s most talked-about and award-winning campaigns.

Guest appearance

Former CEO, DDB Canada
Frank Palmer

Frank Palmer is a legendary Canadian advertising pioneer with over 50 years of experience in the industry.

Footnotes

In this episode, we delve into Advertising. We reference various sources, studies, and expert opinions. For more details and to explore the resources mentioned, check out the links and additional information below.

Episode transcript

Frank Palmer 00:00

What do you mean? I'm not pitching books. I'm not going to pitch it. They got to give it to me. Frank, we own you. I said, I don't care. I'm not doing it.Guess what? They gave it to me. First time that's ever been done to this day where I was able to switch, you know why? Coming back to the word, trust. And I told them upfront that I'm never going to cheat you. I'm going to do the right thing for you. Doesn't happen like that today. 

Mo Dhaliwal 00:31

Welcome to High Agency, igniting conversations with inspiring people, leading transformative change. What happens when an entire industry transforms beneath your feet, not just once, but repeatedly over the course of, let's say, five decades? Amazon now controls over 75% of all e-commerce spent, generating $46 billion annually. That's more revenue than many legacy media companies are worth entirely.AI advertising searches have exploded over 500% in just two years, and meanwhile, a quarter of adults won't give brands even a scant 10 seconds before skipping a video ad. Meanwhile on Facebook, 85% of their users are watching content with the sound completely off. So the game has changed fundamentally, and while social platforms have been commanding more ad dollars than TV, print, and radio combined for many years, this story is far from done. Through every seismic shift from the Mad Men era to the more sort of math men revolution of today, certain principles are enduring, and the best advertising still tells stories that matter. Your brand still needs a soul, and creative excellence remains the difference between noise and resonance. In fact, as AI enables content generation at massive scale, human creativity may well be the last remaining beacon as we all drown in this ocean of AI-generated content. And few have witnessed and felt an industry evolution more intimately than Frank Palmer. Frank has over 50 years of experience in the advertising industry. He built Palmer Jarvis, Canada's most creatively acclaimed marketing communications agency, from humble Vancouver beginnings. And when he architected a merger with DDB Worldwide, Frank established DDB Canada, creating a powerhouse network that was renowned for producing the countries most talked about, and award-winning campaigns. He's a visionary leader who transformed Canadian advertising. Frank continues to shape the industry through innovative brand strategies and his unwavering commitment to creative excellence.Welcome, Mr. Palmer. 

Frank Palmer 02:57

Thank you. Thanks, Mo. Good to be here. 

Mo Dhaliwal 03:00

So, it's an understatement to say you've had a long history in advertising, you know a little bit about the industry. But I think where we want to start today is, frankly, why you got into it. And I think a bigger part of the conversation is going to be about change, right? Our podcast and our whole conversation is really about transformative change, how we weather it, how we manage it, and sometimes how we try to catalyze that change. But let's go back to the beginning. You always had an interest in art. 

Frank Palmer 03:34

Well, I was pretty good at it, you know, I was from a young child, I was able to, you know, drug Bugs Bunny and Donald Duck and Mickey Mouse and all that. And there was, I had a choice of, well, I did go to art school, which was Vancouver School of Art, which changed its name to Emily Carr. So I went to art school for probably about three years and then graduated from school.And then I had a couple of choices of, I wanted to be a cop. And I wrote the test in Vancouver, there was 400 of us writing this test. And I was very, very good at remembering faces, not necessary names, but if you, if I saw you on an airplane and I saw you, I would say saw you on the street, I wouldn't say you're on my plane. So out of the 400 people that wrote that test, there was only 10 of us that passed. So back then, when I was in better shape, I passed a physical test and I passed the test of picking up bad people, you know, four hours later, but I'd never passed a psychological test. And that's when I was being interviewed by the police chief of police. And so it took me about 20 years before somebody who was an HR person said, I can tell you why you never passed that test, Frank.And they said, I said, well, tell me why. And they said, well, they knew you wouldn't take instructions or directions. And I said, well, I thought maybe they didn't want to give me a gun. But I went and then but I ended up going to getting a job at KVOS-TV, which is a border station, Channel 12. And that was the beginning of my career in the art sort of field or advertising.And I was fascinated from it because in those early days of KVOS-TV, they were doing the Beatles, the first animated Beatles series where they were doing it all by cells, where they have to paint the cell and draw the cell and where it's totally changed today. So for me, it was fascinating. And that's how I and then when I left there, I got a job working for a direct mail company and I met Red Robinson, a disc jockey in Vancouver, who had was also partners with a guy by the name of Rich Simmons and Red wanted to get out of it. So I ended up becoming a partner with Rich Simmons way back way back in 1969, April Fool's Day. 

Mo Dhaliwal 06:05

Wow. KVO-TV though. So that was your first big, first job. 

Frank Palmer 06:11

They offered me $500 a month and I thought I'd died and went to heaven. 

Mo Dhaliwal 06:15

Because you get to do what you love all day. 

Frank Palmer 06:16

Maybe you get to do what you want to do, but just somebody paying you for something that you love to do, right? You didn't take that with, you know, getting paid for something that you really would do probably for nothing almost, you know? 

Mo Dhaliwal 06:25

So, why look beyond that, like what, why did the sort of like entrepreneurial-?

Frank Palmer 06:31

Well, I don't know. I like doing deals. And when I was working even with KVOS-TV, I still had a freelance job where people would want me to do logos, design a logo for them. And I would do that at night. I'd go to a client and pick up what they wanted me to do for their company. And I'd just design a logo and take it back to them and say, it's 300 bucks.And what happened then is the fellow that I was working with said, well, you did it overnight and then I'll give you a hundred bucks for it. And so what are you going to do? You take the hundred bucks. But then I figured out pretty quick, I'd put it in my drawer for three days. And even though it took me the same amount of time, but it was worth more if it took longer. So I put it in my drawer for three days to charge me $500. But if the problem is, it's like, if you can do it, you've been trained to do it. The price is the price, not because it took a long time or a short time. Did you get what you wanted? The value.

Mo Dhaliwal 07:35

Yeah. I mean, I think that's something we still struggle with, right?We're in an industry where you're actually kind of punished for being smart and efficient, right? If you've got the right answer, but if you got it too soon. 

Frank Palmer 07:48

Well, if you got the right answer, you should still get paid for what it's worth. And I think that's what's happening to a lot of businesses now.You want it fast. I mean, if you move 50 years ahead, people still want quality work and they want it fast. And so fast is something that should still charge. You should still charge for it, even if you're able to do it fast. But a lot of clients don't look at it that way. 

Mo Dhaliwal 08:15

So you were still moonlighting as this sort of, uh, logo designer and, uh, taking on the side gigs. And so that's where you kind of got your taste of actually working with the client and figuring your deals, what to charge. 

Frank Palmer 08:29

Yeah, I mean for me being as creative as I was at that time and working with some very interesting clients way back when where you could actually be, I mean one of my favourite clients that I did way back when it was Carter GM and of course my love of cars and fast cars and that kind of stuff and we brought in a guy, Jackson Davies, who was the constable constable on the Beachcombers and I can remember sitting around with Howard Carter at the time and showing them the commercials that we were going to do because Jackson was a comedian and everything we did at the car dealership would be wrong. I mean he would wash a car and he'd slip on the soap and or he would brand the car but the brand was upside down.So everything he did was wrong and I can remember sitting in the room with Howard Carter way back when and saying this is going to be really great for your dealership because you're having fun because car dealers are always people don't trust car dealers right to even to this day they're not trusted because the only person in a car dealership and I'll get blamed for this I probably won't get any car accounts but the fact the guy who runs the dealership is the finance guy he's that's who sells you your car because he wants to sell you a low jack and he wants to sell you so much other stuff that you don't really need but Howard said to me well is this campaign going to work and how fast is it going to work I said it's not going to work fast it's going to take six months and almost to the day six months later Carter Jim was the most uh the biggest dealership in in the lower mainland sold Bora Pontiacs and Buicks and and uh firebirds and you name it and uh it just took that long because then people started saying a dealership that can have fun with themselves and people could trust them and yeah and I used to go to the car lot on my own on a regular basis and just walk around the car lot and people say what kind of car is that I say it's a GTO, uh, it's 455 horsepower it's got this and that and got this well well yeah well I'd like to maybe buy it I said well you got to go talk to a salesman and he's what are you doing I'm just the guy that's their advertising because I really got into it I really like that I I mean to this day I still love the business of advertising and and find it a way that people will become comfortable with what they're doing or buying. 

Mo Dhaliwal 11:04

Telling the truth. Aside from the creative expression, what do you think you love about it? 

Frank Palmer 11:10

I just love the idea of that you can create a movement for a product or service that if people were telling the best things about it. I mean, yesterday a fellow was asking me, he said, can I ask you for your advice?He said, he's a wealth manager, okay? And he said, I'd like to reach out to people 65 plus to see if I can get them to buy into my wealth management. I said, well, you're probably going about it wrong because I don't want to be told in 65 plus, but at the same time, I'm not willing to really give you a full portfolio. I might give you a chance if you ask me the right way. And he said, oh, I never thought about it that way. I should have charged him and I think he's going to do that. But it's for me, a lot of clients don't, they don't get what they have and they don't know how to promote what they have in the right way. And sometimes it's just a little trick and changing something or an intro on something. 

Mo Dhaliwal 12:13

And that's where creativity plays a big part. Rory Sutherland from Ogilvy has this famous quote where he said that our obsession with efficiency over effectiveness has us really deprioritizing creativity because so much of not just car dealership, but so much of advertising is actually run by finance managers these days.That's right. Efficiency, efficiency, efficiency, at all costs without necessarily even looking at what effectiveness is that efficiency actually getting us. That's where creativity is played in because you could have the most incredible idea and sure up front it might look a little inefficient, but if it's incredibly effective, then that's actually what your goal is and that's what you're after in the first place. 

Frank Palmer 13:04

Yeah, I think that when I jumped back just a bit to the reason that when I wanted to be a cop and I noticed things was we were presenting a new campaign to Mother Nature's gas station, which is called Mohawk Oil. I don't know if you remember that, but Mohawk would put ethanol in the gasoline to give it better performance, right? So I was in the presentation and Bill Duncan, who was the president at the time, and his marketing director, Jeff Campbell, were there, and they were making a presentation, or we were making a presentation to them. And I was watching Bill all through the presentation, and I could see that he was a bit nervous and jittery, and we sold the campaign.And Bill's office was back in Burnaby, so I knew he'd take an hour to get back from our office. So I phoned him right after. I phoned him, hey, Bill Frank. He said, yeah, it was great seeing you, Frank. I said, Bill, I noticed that you were a bit nervous. And he said, yeah, you know, I'm a bit nervous. You know, it's kind of an edgy campaign. I said, yeah, but you're nervous, right? He said, yeah, I'm a bit nervous. I said, well, I'm not going to let you do it. He said, what do you mean? I said, I don't want you doing something that you're nervous about. He said, well, you know, I'm the president of the company, and I leave it with my marketing people. I said, yeah, I know, but I'm not going to let you do it. He said, what am I going to do? I said, well, you're going to go talk to your marketing guy. You're going to tell him the agency has to come up with some more commercials because you're nervous about the... He said, can I do that? I said, Bill, are you the president? He said, yeah, you can do that. So I'm sitting in my office, and the fellow that was selling it from our end came in, and he said, Frank, you're not going to believe this. I said, what? Bill Duncan wants us to do some more commercials just after we sold them. I said, are you telling me that? But you know what? I could sell Bill from that day on anything I wanted because my whole purpose in life is to give people the best advice and do something that they're comfortable with. And it turned out that the second set of commercials were better than the first set that we sold them, and they got great results.So everything I try to do with a client is to make sure that I'm not bullshitting, you know? Making something out of something that's not. And I was able to, over the whole career, my clients became friends. And they would come into the agency and just want to talk. They didn't care about the advertising. They wanted to get out of the house. 

Mo Dhaliwal 15:42

I mean, and that's a lot of trust to build with somebody, especially when historically you're in an industry where there's some assumed level of coercion, right? There's some assumed level of either with the client or with the public that something's being masked and sold. I mean, I think some of those associations have changed, but that definitely is what came out of the industry, I think, in the 70s and 80s. 

Frank Palmer 16:06

Well, advertising is built or created to sell stuff that may be not necessarily be as good as it's meant to be, right? And that's the job of trying to take something and turn it into a better product or service or it's going to make you smell better and feel better and all that kind of stuff. But we've also watched how advertising can backfire if it's done wrong, The Bud Light, even with the Cracker Barrel restaurant. And you just see how it can backfire because they didn't do proper research.

Mo Dhaliwal 16:44

Jaguar recently. 

Frank Palmer 16:45

Jaguar was another one. And you look at it and they didn't do enough research on what the values were, why people went to the restaurant or why people are buying a Jaguar, why are they drinking Bud Light? I mean, and we for years, we did the Bud Light commercials and created the Bud Light Institute and it was a whole farce on young men who are drinking Bud Light, right? And we had so much fun doing it and we were selling Bud Light off the clock because that's what we were reaching out to, young guys that want to have fun, right? I remember the bar, we were going into the fridge from behind the wall and then the commercial was where's the Bud Light and the guys, you know, he's coming from the inside wall and going into the fridge in the back end. Well, I mean, all that stuff made a hit with the young people, you know what I mean? And for me, it's all about having fun.I mean, for me in the business for over 50 years, I've had fun for the most part. It's been fun for me and how many guys get an opportunity to get in a job where you can have fun? 

Mo Dhaliwal 17:56

Was it more fun before?

Frank Palmer 17:58

There's not much fun now. 

Mo Dhaliwal 18:00

Yeah, you're still here. 

Frank Palmer 18:01

Yeah, I know but I I'm still here because I still believe I can find the client or two that Still wants to be able to do advertising It makes a difference and tell the truth to the public or want to buy the product or service and I I don't know sure how many of those I might end up finding as a client, but The fact of the matter is I think there's still some out there that are willing to take a risk And not just listen to the bean counter.

Mo Dhaliwal 18:29

Was that where the fun went, was that? 

Frank Palmer 18:32

Well, the fun has what happened was for me was that I always in my whole entire career over 50 years, I've lost clients and I've lost money on clients that have been paid. But at the end of the year, I've never ever had a year where the company lost any money. Meaning that at the end of the year, 12 months, I was always positive. I never had a year where we were to this day, knock on wood. I've still never had a year where the company didn't make money at the end of the year.I've had clients that walk out and didn't pay, as I said. But the company that I created, along with other really talented people, so you can't take credit on your own, is that DDB became the most awarded advertising agency in Canada and to this day still is. Even after I haven't been there for six years, it's still the most awarded advertising agency. But what happened was the company was ending up being run by accountants and accountants want to squeeze you on every single thing that you do. And they squeezed all the creativity out of the company because the only way at the end of the day you could make more money is be hiring people that aren't as competent as the ones that you are paying more money to. And there you get people that aren't as good and then clients leave you. And so DDB looks, well, there is no DDB in Canada anymore.It's gone. After 750 employees I had. I had offices in Vancouver, Victoria, Calgary, Edmonton, Winnipeg. And then when I did the deal, we had offices in Toronto and Montreal, 700 to 50 to 800 employees, did probably close to a billion dollars in sales back then. But it got to the point, never lost money, gave them money every year, 20% margin plus. And what happened was is that they started cutting back on everything, you know, the charging areas that you didn't know you were being charged on. So they put themselves out of business because they weren't given the client, the product that the client wanted. I mean, we had great clients. I mean, we had McDonald's, we had Volkswagen. We even did work with Procter & Gamble, you know. And we were doing great work and work that was not only selling cars and selling hamburgers, but making profit and running good ads. And today I would have to say in looking at most, if you're watching television, I would say I rarely see a commercial that isn't a piece of crap. You know, they want to put everything into it and it's lost its spark. There's nothing much good out there. So you wonder why products aren't doing all that well. There's no soul. There's no creativity that have gone into it. It's, you know, it's just lost. When I see a good spot, somebody thought about that. But very rare. 

Mo Dhaliwal 21:45

I feel like it's once a year where we get the opportunity to talk on those terms and it's like the Super Bowl, right? Because it seems like there's a bit more appetite for creative risk, higher budgets, and there's a bit of a culture that's come up about what is the major brands Super Bowl ad going to be this year.So that's almost like the localized place where we're able to see some of that. But other than that, I agree with you. 

Frank Palmer 22:11

Those commercials, we did commercials for Super Bowl. And back then, I mean, you'd spend half a million to a million dollars on a commercial or two that was gonna run into Super Bowl.Now, the thing that drives me crazy as an advertising guy, if I'm watching a program I want to watch, and the commercial comes on and tells me that a A&W burger is on for $499, I got it. Then I'm watching it again and another, it comes on again, $499, I got it, okay? And six or seven times I go, I couldn't care if your burgers are free, I'm not gonna go see you. You're running that commercial too many times. And what happens is that the person who's bought the commercials, the media director, has done a lazy job, in my opinion, programming this commercial to the point where you're making me mad now. I wanna go get the burger, but I don't want it now because you just turned me off, because you're bothering me. 

Mo Dhaliwal 23:19

Do you think that's playing to maybe more modern attention spans? Because, um, like I'm not sure you heard of this, um, idea of like second screen, but it's this notion even with, um, like production of shows for Netflix, et cetera.And, I only read about this recently that there's an entire category of production that are seen to be friendly to second screen, meaning that you've got the show on in the background and the plot isn't too deep and whatever is happening, it's repetitive enough that you can be like looking back and forth to your phone all the time and distracted, but still kind of having an understanding of what's going on with. 

Frank Palmer 23:58

I wonder whether or not that is planned on purpose or whether it's just a habit. And one of the biggest problems that we have right now, and somebody's going to actually reach out and do something about it, is that screen time for young children is a problem. And it's now starting to cause mental health issues on four and five and six year olds that have suicidal thoughts. And parents and telcos are going to have to do something about it because it's going to be mandated.It's no different than drinking addiction, gambling addiction, porn addiction. It's addiction. And you're going to have to be using regulations eventually around it because it's not healthy for young people. Because it's not just there. The problem is right now, I'm addicted to watching my phone, but I also won't take my phone out of my pocket if I'm with somebody and watch it because if you're asking me a question and my phone rings, then that phone call is more important than my conversation with you. Plus, I might lose track of where we were. You go, well, I don't know. You've lost track because you're a train of thought. And you just have to be careful with that kind of addiction.And the addiction is that screen addiction, TV. A lot of it I don't remember anymore because nothing is really all that good. Even on Netflix, I got a screen through. I know the plot already before the first five seconds. No, I don't want to watch that. I know they're going to get killed. You know what I mean? I'm very selective now and I get mad at certain things. I go, how did you create that piece of crap? Why? 

Mo Dhaliwal 26:05

Well, I mean, the media environment is probably the biggest change because there was a time where whether it was TV, movie, even certain ads, the media environment was singular. So if somebody was going to consume media, we're all consuming the same. And so even cultural messages landed on an entire community or an entire population together.And now things are so fragmented, it's yes, the volume's increased, but there's also just an infinite number of channels that are carrying lots of mediocre stuff as well. 

Frank Palmer 26:39

When you go through, and it doesn't matter what you're on, whether you're on Bell, Rogers, or TELUS, and you go to the guide, and you've got 600 channels, or whatever it is, and you go from all the way from the top to the bottom, and you go, there's nothing I want to watch. Right?And you go, how can there be 600 crappy channels? You know? And the other thing is, whether young people like it or not, there's no Johnny Carson left on TV. 

Mo Dhaliwal 27:15

You're not a fan of the current Late Night? 

Frank Palmer 27:17

Because they don't have entertainment. They play tricks and games and throw pies in each other's face. And they don't have that.I mean, I used to stay up every night to watch Johnny Carson, you know, and it tells everybody how old I am. But the fact of the matter was, it was instantaneous humour when they had Don Rickles and you would laugh at it. I don't laugh at anything that most of the guys on TV do now anymore, you know, because it's, you know, eating hot wings and stuff, you know, I mean, I don't find that funny. 

Mo Dhaliwal 27:50

And the Jimmy Fallon stuff is probably pretty staged now. 

Frank Palmer 27:53

Well, of course, yeah, he would have it all staged ahead of time, and I don't find... I might watch if I see who's on that night. But I don't normally watch it anymore, and I'll try and flip through and see what's best on Apple TV, or if there's something new on Prime, or is there something new on Netflix.Or I go into my office and write a memo to me, to myself, that I might want to send to somebody some day to stick a thorn in their side, because like that article that came out today that said that WPP is doing a deal with a firm, McKinsey, and you go, these guys are eating our lunch now, because the client wants to go and get some results, so they come to an agency, you guys do ads, I want to get results for what I'm doing, so you're going to the enemy and feeding them your bullets. I go, what are you, nuts? Why is a... Well, because they say they're revenue falling, so they go, we don't have an answer for it, let's go to a firm to see if they can help us. No, you help yourself, you're doing work for clients that are crap, no wonder you have problems. You don't have creative people that are as good anymore. 

Mo Dhaliwal 29:15

Let's take a bit of a walk down memory lane, because I feel like there's a lot that we can definitely critique about the current media environment, the damage, the harms, the sheer amount of mediocrity. And I mentioned that in the opening as well, that everything that you're saying is just going to go to 100x with AI proliferating everywhere. So we're just going to see oceans of, I think, more average in media over stuff than we've ever seen before.And so on the one hand, that sucks, but on the other hand, it actually, I think, is going to create a new day for the creatives, because that human discernment, that real quality and ability to understand what's going to really hit people in the gut or in the heart or in the mind and inspire them and get them engaged in a message, I mean, there was a time when that was the expectation that if you're producing an ad, if it's a big brand doing something, that's going to make you feel something all the time. So what was so different about life in the early days of Palmer Jarvis, like, you know, we do digital marketing, digital advertising, very different realm. I was kind of, you know, born in this era. But what was the day to day like for running an agency back in the day? 

Frank Palmer 30:34

Well, you probably remember the series called Mad Men. 

Mo Dhaliwal 30:38

Absolutely. Love Mad Men. 

Frank Palmer 30:39

And Mad Men was, I was at the tail end basically. And people smoked in the office and wore ties and suits. Back then, a lot of clients who would come in to see me early in the morning and want to talk about their life. And these are clients that ran big organizations and retail firms. And they'd come in and talk to me personally. And it wasn't about advertising. They just wanted to have somebody to list, somebody to talk to, somebody that they could trust.And they'd say, where's your fridge? And they'd say right over there, they want a glass of scotch or a beer early in the morning and sit around and we'd talk for an hour in the first thing in the morning. But we always got around to do an advertising for them. But in those days, Mad Men was exactly what you saw on TV, was what we lived for. 

Mo Dhaliwal 31:35

Really? 

Frank Palmer 31:36

Yeah. 

Mo Dhaliwal 31:36

So that amount of partying? 

Frank Palmer 31:38

It was a party, mostly a party. It was a lot of partying. There was no question about it. That doesn't happen anymore. And the problem is that half the time there's nobody in the office anyways to have a party with. They're probably working from home or saying they're working from home, which they're not. 

Mo Dhaliwal 31:55

Yeah, I mean, it's a little bit hard to have the Mad Men atmosphere when everybody is remote on Zoom. 

Frank Palmer 32:02

Well, and I think that the other part of it is I don't think you're going to get the same creative working from home. I don't think you can, you know, you, you wouldn't, I can't look at you in the eye and see the, you know, the twitch or the nervous action. I couldn't see what Bill Duncan, I couldn't see that. I wouldn't see that on Zoom.And, uh, but yeah, I mean, back that was a lot more fun because I was really involved with the clients. I felt that I could get into the boardroom with the president of organizations. And, and, and, uh, that's when they were in the boardroom, they, they were wanting to be involved in the advertising. And then over a period of time that advertising got passed off to marketing directors and the directors, the marketing directors don't have that. It's like saying to you, how do I, how do you think I'm feeling right now? You'd say, well, I don't know you well enough to know that, but I knew the marketing, I knew the advertising. I knew that what I could sell a client, because I, I could feel what they wanted and what they needed. And that's when we got great advertising. And, and you don't, you can't do that today. You just don't get that same kind of, uh, buzz, I guess. And, uh, so, so the old days for me were the best days and I'd go back to 1970 or 80 or 90 and a heartbeat if I could, but you can't. 

Mo Dhaliwal 33:21

What's your favourite memory, your favourite story from that era? 

Frank Palmer 33:24

I can remember when one of my favourite clients, McDonald's, and the client was Ron Marcoux. And Ron Marcoux was a really tough guy, big guy like you, tough guy. And my job was to do advertising for them that I felt that would, first of all, do the best we could for their Big Macs and quarter pounders of cheese. And Ron was pushing me around, like he was pushing me around, you know, you're not doing enough to do that. And I said to Ron, fuck off. I'm doing the best job I can for you, and all you're doing is pushing me around. And if you don't think I'm doing enough for you, then fucking fire me. And right after that, we became buddies.And it was just testing me. And a lot of times clients do that, and they want to see what you're made of. And it was just one of the best relationships I think I had ever, and it became a mentor after that. Same thing with a guy called Bill Bremer that used to run an agency called Rickardson Betson. And there'd be something I couldn't figure out. I'd go, why is this guy pushing me around? I don't get this. I'm the boss. This guy's... He looks at me and he says, you don't get it? I said, no, I don't get it. He said, he's testing you. What do you mean he's tested me? I'm the boss. He's testing you. And so I get back, and when a guy does it again, I said, fuck off. It ended it. So, I mean, the point is, I think that over time, in 50 years, maybe I've become a bit of a mentor, right?And I wouldn't do that if I was you. I wouldn't do that if I was you. Why? Because it's not the right thing to do for your product or service. But the best days were... Maybe the best days for young people today are now because they don't know the past. But if you knew the past, you would say, no, those are the best days. Those are the Mad Men days.Those are the days when you could do really great advertising. That's the days when I wanted to go to New York and I wanted to sit in... Bill Birnback was the guy that came up with the lemon for Volkswagen. How did the snowplow get to the snowplow? How did the snowblower get to the snowplow? He drove a Volkswagen. I was in New York for six weeks, and I worked out of Bill Birnback's office. For me, that was like... Incredible. You know, I mean, it's like in the early days of our offices downtown, when my then new boss, Ken Case, which became good friends, tell you stories about Ken, we became good friends and he would come up to our office and said, Frank, I can't believe the energy in here. It's in the paint. I just want to come and watch people come and go. It's just so much activity. You don't have that activity in an office today because there's nobody in it. How can you create anything that has any kind of joy or any kind of magic when there's nobody there to create it? I can't walk up to you on... I'll give you a call and, hey, Mo, I want to talk to you about something. I can't just walk over to you and say, hey, Mo, I was thinking about this. What do you think about it? 

Frank Palmer 36:54

Hey, you know, if you want to do that, you can change it. You don't have that. You can't do that. And you wonder why advertising sucks.The best agencies are the new independents. But the problem is, as they get bigger, they become bureaucratic and that's what's happening. Don't get too big. And the best agencies in Canada are no longer around, taxi. No taxi anymore. Taxi was a competitor. There's no taxi. There's no Sapphire advertising. He was the best retail agency in Canada. No Sapphire advertising anymore.

Mo Dhaliwal 37:26

Do they get absorbed or...

Frank Palmer 37:27

 No, they go out of business. He took a bath. He took a client on it, took him down. But the fact is that the best agencies in Canada are the smaller independents, but they now have 70 or 90 employees and they're going to run into the same problem. They get too big. And then the problem is they get one or two clients that control their business. So then they got to start not doing work that they want to do because they got to do work because 60% of your business is one client. What are you going to do?Are you going to tell the client to go to hell? Probably not. Are you going to walk in with one idea or three ideas? Why? Because they might not want the one you want to do. I would be like, this is the one you're going to do. I remember going and having to go to Greyhound Air. Okay. Greyhound was a bus line and they wanted to start an airline because they felt that they could have an airplane that would be cheap, right? And people would buy it, go on it because they could fly for a reasonable fare. And so they bought these old planes and it was taken a long time to get the planes up to get ready to fly. But I had to go pitch the campaign to a bunch of stuffy board directors at Greyhound Air. And there was about, they're all younger than me now, but they're probably all seventy year olds. And the whole campaign was based around a dog, a Greyhound dog that would walk over to the plane on the wheel, lift up the leg and pee on the wheel and it said marking new territory, Greyhound Air, right? Now I had to pitch that, right? And I went and pitched it. There was dead silence that seemed to be like an hour. Nobody said anything except the one guy said, that's the best damn commercial I think I've ever seen. And guess what happened? The rest of the directors all said, that's the best commercial. And we shot that commercial because we trained the dog to pee on a wheel. And then we took the dog to the airport and the dog had a leash on it. Because if the dog got a, you know, ran away, they'd have to shoot the dog. But dog walked over to the plane, peed on the wheel, one take.We had the commercial. So you talk about stories. I have hundreds of stories like that. Things that, how did that happen? Or the practical joke that Ron Marcoux played on me? 

Mo Dhaliwal 39:58

What was that? 

Frank Palmer 39:59

Well, we were doing a Fillet-O-Fish or something like that. And the Fillet-O-Fish was a $1.99 or $2.99 or whatever it was at the time. 

Frank Palmer 40:09

And I got a call from them and say, Frank, what the hell did you just do? The billboard says 69 cents. And so they faked up a billboard that said 69 cents and made it where I'd go take a look. And I go, how the hell did that happen? The 69 cents. I go, lose the goddamn business over this stupidity trick.And of course, it was getting me even with my own tricks. You know what I mean? Because I'm a practical joker. They got me. He wouldn't do that today. I was taking a vacation in Italy for two weeks. And the guy that was our chief financial officer, Bill Keith Bremer, played a joke on me. He had somebody come in, take my office door off, put a wall there, plastered the whole thing up. So when I got come back from holidays, I couldn't find my office. My office was got to go, where's my office? It's gone.It must have cost him $5,000 to do that, right? I mean, it's, yeah. I mean, you know, the things that I could pull on my Hillary, there's a, there's a product called Anbersol. And Anbersol is a product that you put on baby's teeth because there's teething. And I had a tube of it in my office. I don't know why I had a tube of it, but my assistant came in in the morning, put her coffee down, went to the washroom. I took a little finger fill of Anbersol, put it around the top of her coffee cup. She comes back. I hear nothing. What she had done is she phoned her sister. She said, I think I'm having a stroke. And she said, why? She said, my lips have gone frozen. And, and, uh, anyways, uh, she comes in and punches me, comes in and punches me in the arm and says, you're such an asshole, Frank.I said, yeah, I know. But you see, you can't do that when there's nobody in the office. I mean, could you pull it off today? I still pull it off. 

Mo Dhaliwal 42:02

I still do that. I feel like for any media-sized company, that might be an HR violation. 

Frank Palmer 42:06

Well, today it probably would be, but you could get away with that back then and all the stupid things that I would do. But the game of advertising- It was fun. It was human. It was fun. I'm trying to say it was fun.There is no fun today. I mean, maybe some agencies have it still, but basically that part of it is gone. And DDB is gone. There's no DDB. The last office of DDB was Edmonton. It was now it's called TBWA. And it reports into Omnicom, but it's all being run by accounting people. What can we shave now? Treasure for water. 

Mo Dhaliwal 42:56

Like, technology had a massive role to play in that. We use terminology here, like phrases like, you know, data-driven decisions, et cetera. And I think I calmed down about that in, you know, probably a number of years ago, actually, because for a time, it just seemed so sexy and attractive, the idea that for any decision, anything that you do, that you could always just back it up with, you know, a spreadsheet, a graph, something that proved the case, right, for what you were trying to get across.And there was something I was reading once, and it said, you know, if that's all you're ever worried about is the data and the supposed efficiency that you're trying to emphasize all the time, that actually, you know, the most efficient place to place an ad would actually be right at the cash register, right? Because you could actually, in data, prove that everybody that saw that ad bought something, right? Yeah. And, you know, data can be shaped and, frankly, tortured to, you know, confess to anything. So we're living in a world that is technology-driven. Technology generates lots of data, and then there's this, you know, problem-solving sort of need and want to respond to that data, make things more efficient. Are you seeing any places now in industry where there's any sort of, like, resistance to that, or where you're seeing those sparks of that humanity, that fun that you're talking about that are starting to re-emerge? 

Frank Palmer 44:23

No. Uh, but I do think that, uh, I mean, I'm not saying data isn't useful, I'd like to have as much information. I mean, the good thing about AI is it scrapes, it scrapes all the data you need to make a decision. And I mean, people got to think about it that way. Listen, this save you a lot of time from going to the library and looking up all the books. So you just have to take two seconds to get the information you want.So I, I'm not afraid of it because, uh, it's not creative. But you have to ask a creative questions in order to get a creative answer. And if you don't get what you want, you ask it again. And then he starts talking to it like, Hey, this is Frank. Now start thinking about how Frank thinks start talking in Frank's words. Don't talk, don't, would you like to have this next sentence in Frank's words? Yes. Yeah. It's me talking to you. And then, you know, when I hear about AI, I'm going to have my own assistant talking to somebody else's assistant and there's no going to be no talking to me. It's going to be everybody else carrying on conversations, right? I'm not afraid of it. In fact, I use it all the time, but, uh, I used to think and still think a bit that data and working with a marketing director is someone to say, well, we did the research and the research proved this out. Was that going to save your job? You know, you didn't, you, you, you're, you're, you're, you're checking shit. You're not willing to take a chance. Take a chance because taking a good chance might, you might come up with something very special. You know, I know damn well, when we were doing the Bud Light stuff, we knew who drank the beer. We knew what made them happy.We didn't do any data search. We didn't do any of that stuff. You know, when bezel advertising in Toronto had the Budweiser business and, and they bezel merged with another company that had had a copy didn't have the Budweiser business. They had a competitor business so that they were going to keep one. And Liz Torley was the lady that had, uh, would rent, she was the president of bezel and David Kincaid, very smart guy was the account, uh, was the manager of the Budweiser account. And I phoned him and I said, uh, I'd like to pitch your business. He said, well, uh, you know, Frank, uh, we just, we merged. We're going to have to be looking for a new agency. I said, yeah. I said, what would you like? He said, I love the people that I had on my business. I said, okay, if I could get you those people, would you be interested? Can I pitch the business? He said, yeah. So then I phoned Liz Torley. I said, Liz, I'm phoning you as a, I would like to talk to all the people that were on the Budweiser business at your agency that you're going to have to fire. Can I do that? She said, because you called me, I'll give you permission. So I interviewed everybody that, and I said, I don't have the business, but if I win it, would you come and work for me? And they all agreed and pitched the business and I won the business and created a company called Downtown Partners, brand new advertising agency. 

Frank Palmer 47:23

And then another story we had, but Downtown Partners changed her name, um, to, um, another one. And I'll think of the name in a minute. And we had, we had Subaru in that agency and we had Subaru in, in, uh, DDB. And I had Volkswagen in the smaller agency. Okay. And Volkswagen, uh, said, uh, we, uh, I got a call from New York and said, Hey Frank, we want you to pitch, uh, the Volkswagen business. I said, I already got it. It's in red urban. He said, yeah, I know that. I said, well, I got Subaru in here. And I said, if I go and pitch that one and we don't win, I'm going to lose Subaru. I can't do that.You have to do it. I said, I'm not doing it. Frank, we own you. I said, I don't care. Not doing it. If they give me the business, I'll do it. What do you mean? I'm not pitching books. I'm not going to pitch it. They got to give it to me. Guess what? Like they gave it to me. And I got DDB to put in, uh, DDB got Volkswagen and then I went to Subaru and I said, I want to take the Subaru business and put it over here. And you know, I can do it because Volkswagen is 10 times bigger. So I had to pitch it, but I want it. So first time that's ever been done to this, to this day where I was able to switch, you know why coming back to the word trust. 

Mo Dhaliwal 48:54

Mm-hmm, they knew you could do it. 

Frank Palmer 48:57

Yeah. And I did it and I told them that upfront that I'm never going to cheat you. I'm going to do the right thing for you. Doesn't happen like that today.There's the trust factor in as, I would say, there's not a lot of trust left in our world today anywhere. It doesn't matter if it's advertising or whether it's whatever business, it's not the same. Just not the same. 

Mo Dhaliwal 49:21

Well, I mean, what you were talking about in terms of like, you know, clients coming by wanting to talk about life, whatever, um, all that's pointing to just having like a real intimate and like personal relationship with these people. And it's so rare that these days we actually talk about it as something quite special, right?I talk about it a lot with our clients. We try to sell it actually. Um, but it's this idea of alignment, right? And so we, we bring on a new client, even onboarding a new client, we actually have to sell the idea of alignment. The idea that we actually need to fly out to where you are. Yes, we can do everything remotely, but we need to come like, you know, like feel your hands when we're, when we're shaking them, we need to be in the same room, um, to read that energy off of each other, to be looking at the same thing on the wall and be coming up with ideas. And the idea that we're going to kind of knit ourselves together early on in the process that we've got, you know, as humans, some sort of actual relationship, but it's become so rare that it's actually something that we've had to introduce as a process called alignment and an alignment workshop, um, that's treated as such a rare and special moment. You know, um, typically only at the outset, uh, maybe once a year beyond that, uh, whereas back in the day that you're describing, it just seemed like that was just how you do business. Like how could you? 

Frank Palmer 50:34

Yeah. But I think it's possible to do again because what I've done, and you and I both went through Frontier, and I met a couple of people there that I think I can do business with. I went to another agency convention and met a couple of people at that agency convention. And so if my model going forward is me and you, and I got a piece of business that maybe might work with you and we can do it together because it comes down to either I trust you or not, I've met some interesting people.So I've created a collective and I'm a fractional marketing guy. I'm not a guy that can sit down and write you the big brief. That's not me, never was me. I just said, you're the guy that does this and does a better job than me. Just so hard, great people. That's what we built a company. It wasn't me by myself building Palmer Jarvis or DDB. I had great people. People like to say, here, take this off me. Why? Cause I need somebody to do it and somebody good. And so you build a collective of people around you that you can count on like a doctor. You know, when you go to your, I'm the generalist. You go to your home doctor. He's not your brain doctor. He's not your heart doctor or blood doctor. He's a specialist. 

Mo Dhaliwal 51:56

He's got your full story down. 

Frank Palmer 51:58

My story now is getting specialists to work with me and I'm just, I'm the generalist that knows where to go or smart enough to know where to go, you know, and I hope that I'm hoping that I can find the odd client that wants to do that with me going forward. I don't know yet.And, uh, and, and if there's something that PS and Co can do, well, then I'll take it to Bob. 

Mo Dhaliwal 52:24

What you're describing, I mean, like I'm actually quite excited for you, Frank, because everything I'm talking about these days, like we've had ex-creative directors, you know, other agency partners we've worked with. And just getting back to that AI thing for a second of like just, you know, drowning in a sea of mediocre content, creativity, I think, is going to be back in a big way.I agree. But the other aspect is actually what you're describing right now, the thing that I've been saying to even some of the marketing directors I'm working with that are like in-house, you know, companies of all sizes from like 50 to, you know, hundreds of employees in more of a B2B space. But what I've been saying to them is kind of what you're describing, which is that, you know, marketing was kind of introduced as this vertical function of, you know, come in, run a campaign, you know, push people in a certain direction. And it's increasingly becoming like this horizontal thing where the people that actually can orchestrate things where they kind of, you know, generally know what's happening, they have their hands in a couple of different domains, but know the people and know how to bring those domains together to make things go. I think they're going to excel because every other category for, you know, intermediate work, you know, AI is going to help. There's a lot of specialists out there, but really the people that can convene that group, bring them together, orchestrate that, I think it's their day now. 

Frank Palmer 53:42

Yeah. Yeah. Like I say, you know, I'm not afraid of it. And I look up on it as it allowed me maybe to do some things that I couldn't do. I mean, I use it all the time for exploring. I might write a letter and say, I think this is good, but give me some tips on this one. And then it comes back. Oh, I never thought of that. Right? So you have to program it. So it saves me a lot of time.And I think creatively going forward, it will be of great use with writers and other creative people that want to use it to their advantage and not be afraid it wasn't your idea. It was your idea, but you just made it better. It's not going to, but I'll tell you what's scary about happening right now is that I can look at my phone and go, I say, I, you know what I mean? Like it's, but it's like, it's so good, but it's still, I know that that's, that's, that's AI for sure. You know, don't try and fool me. Like pen and pen and teller. Remember the TV series pen and teller. You fooled me. No, you didn't fool me. I it's, it's AI for sure. But the opportunities going forward for me are, I, I personally couldn't care if I ever did a radio commercial TV commercial billboard of the rest of my life. What I want to do is get, take it to somebody who wants to do that. But the information that's coming to me on products and services today are really interesting and payment systems and new ways of somebody's payment system, a new health system of coughing into your phone. It tells you whether you've got COVID or a certain- what can I do with those and who do I take them to and how do we create a campaign around that? And, and to me, that's really exciting. So it's been fun with it. 

Mo Dhaliwal 55:51

And that's what you're doing Frank. 

Frank Palmer 55:53

I hope so. We'll see. Time will tell. 

Mo Dhaliwal 55:58

How long would you start your latest entrepreneurial journey here? 

Frank Palmer 56:02

It's been about a month. 

Mo Dhaliwal 56:02

A month? 

Frank Palmer 56:04

Bob and I are still partners. And, you know, I'll probably keep an office there for a while and we'll see what happens.But I'm running into some very interesting new products and services that wouldn't have come to an advertising agency because they're more entrepreneurial. They're start-ups and going into new areas that will require advertising, but right now what they need is some marketing sense, you know, figuring out what to do with it. What would you do with this? Like, one came to me this past week where the whole program is to help young people affordability and building and getting into homes. So if you can imagine a trailer home that comes completely equipped with fridges and stoves and everything in it, you can imagine that being built into a square and they just put them on top of each other, plug in and sign up the water and electricity, build fast, shape more economical, interesting. So there's a lot of things out there that we're going to see going forward that are going to be quite exciting, but they're out to help young people that can't afford homes.You know, it's just, you know, this homeless problem has to be resolved. It's getting worse.There's  just lots of things and opportunities that I think that maybe I can help put a little a little fingerprint on.

Mo Dhaliwal 57:51

As you're talking, one thing that kind of strikes me as a really interesting is, you know, you don't seem to have a lot of ego about your history because I think about like, you know, the job titles that you've held, right?And they're quite massive, right? Like as, you know, like the chairman and head of, you know, DDB Canada, you know, your firm before that. And for somebody that's held these roles and fairly massive job titles and the profile that you've had in the industry to then head out and almost, because you're kind of really giving me like a freelancer vibe, right? Of, you know, you're out there, you know, as an entrepreneur again, almost as a freelancer, just working directly with the, you know, even the size of companies that you're talking about, they're doing new and fresh and interesting things. You know, sometimes I think that people get a little caught up with their own sort of legend, their own lineage and their story, and it might even prevent them from doing things because they don't want to be seen as... 

Frank Palmer 58:46

Well, they're afraid of failing. People asked me the other day about failure. And I go, um, that was at the conference. The lady came up to me, uh, uh, Marley and said, uh, are you afraid of failing? I go, no. Why? Well, because if you don't fail, you don't learn.If you did everything and you were winning all the time, you're going to think you can't fail. And then when you do fail, and if you watch the new movie out with, uh, the rock called the smashing machine, he plays the role of Mike Kerr and Mike Kerr is an MMM fighter and, uh, he's never lost until he loses. And then he, when he lost, he, he didn't think he could lose. Right. And he was interviewed by saying, uh, well, what do you, if you lose, he said, I can't think of that. I can't think of that. But I've never thought of myself ever, uh, I've done something without the, uh, the, uh, with other people. It's always been a team. Stop me. I might've been the coach. I'm talking to a lady, uh, now who's indigenous, right? And I want to be very involved with indigenous and, uh, she said, why would you deal with me? You know, I said, because I think you have something really valuable, and she said, I'd like to work with you. And I said, well, let's see what we can do together. Right. To me, it's all new and interesting and being curious, but I've never taken myself as, uh, that person. I got an ego like you, I'm sure, but, I don't wear it. 

Mo Dhaliwal 01:00:31

Are there, are there any like huge lessons that you learned specifically that you remember? I mean, I'm sure there's been many, but you know, it's, it's good to not be afraid of losing and the obvious, you know, attitude and perspective you have towards it.But was there anything in particular where you took a hit and had to realign and regroup in some meaningful way? 

Frank Palmer 01:00:53

Well, you know, my second book that I wrote was called 'My Dad Ate All the Fuckin' Ice Cream'. And what it was about was I had a habit of writing something every week in the office that I either liked or didn't like. And I'd send it out to 700 people. And I was talking about Yumo hoping that you would read the memo. But I was talking to the other 799 saying, I better not do that because Frank's kind of pissed off, right?So there was a guy in the office, his name was Greg. And Greg at that time was doing the flyers for a company like Safeway. The, you know, how you get the cheap flyers that you get in the mail that usually don't even read, you throw them away. And I promoted Greg from an art director to a senior art director, but he decided that he wasn't going to do the flyer anymore because he just got promoted. And at that time, George Jarvis and myself both had to sign paychecks by hand, had to have two signatures. So I didn't sign his paycheck. And he went to the bank and the bank wouldn't cash it because it didn't have my name on it. So he comes back to me and he said, Hey, Frank, uh, he didn't sign my paycheck. And I said, I don't do that anymore. And he said, oh, the flyer. I said, yeah, you still do the flyer. And to this day, I still do the flyer.You know what I mean? I get the water. I get the bank, make the coffee. I'm there in the morning to make the coffee. I don't ask anybody else to do it. Why? I thought that that's me. I always have been. And on my Remembrance Day, I was feeling a little, uh, I don't want to say sad, but I was thinking about Remembrance Day and, and, uh, and all these, uh, heroes that went to war for us. And I was sitting with a guy whose birthday, uh, was September the 1st and my birthday is September the 2nd. And I went online and I said, when was the war started? Second World War, September 1st, 1939. When did it end? September 2nd, 1940. Now, that's kind of odd, eh? Why he was, and he and I talking his birthdays, and I'm now talking about the war. And I lived, I was a young boy, right? But to me, what's happening a lot of times are, that's weird that that happened. Why? I don't know. Reasons. And I, sometimes I think about something as it happens, you know, I mean, I'm not spiritual or anything like that, but it's just, I think for me, but this could end up being the most fun time for me going for it. 

Mo Dhaliwal 01:03:52

Oh, sounds like it. I mean, I think anytime you're doing something you love and you're doing it with, uh, like really good people that are good at what they do, um, I mean, that can only be a fun situation. 

Frank Palmer 01:04:05

Yeah, I hope so. And I think one of the best things that have happened in the last little while is I got to meet you again.Yeah. I said to a guy that I was interviewing, he used to work for me, and his name's Neil McCostridge, and he runs an agency in Toronto called Fresh Sheet. So it's a fresh idea on a sheet of paper. And before I started interviewing him, I went to see what he was doing and saw the work that he was doing. And I said, send me a resume and send me some of the stuff you've been doing. And I phoned him up and I said, Neil, I said, before I want to do this interview of you, I said, I want to apologize. He said, for what? I said, I didn't know how goddamn good you were when you worked for me. I said, the commercials that you did for Canadian Tire, we all play for Canada are so emotional and so good that I just had to tell you that. And I said, I'm sorry, I didn't tell you that when you worked with me. And he said, probably the best compliment ever had. And I meant it. And we had a good interview. And I said, if I get to do for a particular client, if they let me do the commercials for them that they should be doing, I'm hiring you to do it. Because when you put that much care into a commercial that has a feeling and what those commercials did for Canadian Tire, people loved it. They got increased sales. Stock price went up and everybody felt proud. It doesn't very happen very often.  And I can tell you a few companies out there that could use this, that should do it. But they don't take a chance, they don't, they're afraid. But that's where their business should be because they're double their sales. I think they'll double their sales.But we got to do the research and data and all that kind of, no, no, no, you're shareholder. That's what you're thinking of. Take a chance, lose your job. 

Mo Dhaliwal 01:06:25

We're all gonna be dead soon, might as well. 

Frank Palmer 01:06:27

Yeah, might as well. Yeah, let's give me another day or two. 

Mo Dhaliwal 01:06:32

Um, Frank, if somebody wants to learn more about you, learn more about brand Frank, uh, where should they go? 

Frank Palmer 01:06:40

brandfrank.ca 

Mo Dhaliwal 01:06:41

That's the place. 

Frank Palmer 01:06:43

Yeah. And there's a, you can ask for a request on there and I'll answer. I mean, I, I get back to everybody that answers, sends me a note. I just say, yes, I can help you or no, I can't.Guy called me yesterday, he said, Hey, I got this new deal for you. And I guarantee you, I guarantee you not to lose your money. I said, there's nothing in the alive, nothing out there that you can't lose your money on. No, no, that's guaranteed, guaranteed. I said, sorry. No, not interested that this happened to know the guy and he's not maybe the best guy to do a business with, but I just know that I don't take that kind of, I can't take a risk like that at my age now, you know, could it be something a little more secure? 

Mo Dhaliwal 01:07:27

No crypto schemes for you. 

Frank Palmer 01:07:29

No, even though somebody made a lot of money on it, right? Not me, but I don't know, I hope I'm going to have some fun going forward, you know? And new friendships. 

Mo Dhaliwal 01:07:46

Sounds amazing. Well, Frank, best of luck with everything you're doing. I'm so glad that actually, at Frontier Collective, the summit that we were able to reconnect. And if there was an opportunity for us to work together, I would love to do it. Um, cause there's so many places where I find myself trying to convince the client to take the leap. So many places where we find ourselves trying to take the thing that has all of the makings of something beautiful and we're trying to put the soul into it. Um, and if we can get any advice or help in bringing some of that magic back to this world, I'd be all for it. 

Frank Palmer 01:08:21

Well, maybe we'll come in and be you. Turn the card. 

Mo Dhaliwal 01:08:26

I like sitting on the side of the couch. 

Frank Palmer 01:08:27

Good stuff. I know. All right. 

Mo Dhaliwal 01:08:30

Well, thanks, Frank. Thanks for coming in. 

Frank Palmer 01:08:32

Welcome. Thank you. 

Mo Dhaliwal 01:08:36

Well, hopefully we've given you a lot to think about. That was High Agency. Like and subscribe, and we will see you next time.

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Mo Dhaliwal

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