The Drum Awards for Marketing - Extended Deadline

-d -h -min -sec

Content Production Agencies Agency Culture

Getting to know… Ashley Geisheker, Leo Burnett Chicago’s new production boss

Author

By Sam Bradley, Senior Reporter

March 25, 2022 | 7 min read

The Drum catches up with Leo Burnett Chicago’s new head of production, Ashley Geisheker, who was widely praised for her most recent work on the headline-grabbing ’Lost Class’ campaign. She tells us what she's learned about building trust with creatives and how the pandemic has changed the course for production.

Ashley Geisheker

Ashley Geisheker runs Leo Burnett Chicago’s production unit / Leo Burnett Chicago

Ashley Geisheker has been bringing advertising out of the boardroom and into reality for almost 20 years, but she can remember her first production gig like it was yesterday.

”It was for Sears Roebuck and Company. I was a very, very young producer and it was a really exciting time. You got to experience really large productions with a lot of different outputs... it was an amazing place ot learn how to produce because there volume we were producing and the different types of work you have to do for a retail client are just vast.”

Since then, she’s worked on the full gamut, from beer to retail to banks.

”It doesn’t matter what sort of production you’re doing, it’s always fun to figure our a creative way of building something,” she says.

The brands, production practices and expectations from audiences have evolved, but Geisheker is still working to bring the big ideas of her colleagues to life.

Some of the agency’s recent work is the kind that lives and dies on its production values – such as the headline-grabbing ’Lost Class’ campaign, which Geisheker led production for.

Creating the spot meant wrangling film crews and set dressers and liaising with gun safety campaign group Change the Ref – not to mention helping to trick the spot’s mark, two-time NRA president David Keene, who was hoodwinked into giving a valedictory speech calling on those same students to honor the memory of founding father James Madison and the second amendment to the US constitution that he drafted.

The twist? His speech went out to an audience of over 3,000 empty chairs, each representing teenage victims of gun violence in the US. The piece was emblematic of the agency’s approach and ability to build innovative arguments for their clients. ”We learned anything can be an ad,” says Geisheker.

Geisheker’s career has taken a slightly unusual path, starting out as an account executive and taking in spells with Wunderman, Y&R, Energy BBDO and VSA Partners. Beginning with that gig for Sears, her work as a producer has brought her from one icon of corporate Chicago to another, in the form of Leo Burnett. After signing up with the agency back in 2018, from this month she’ll be running the show as head of production.

Her step up follows a series of new production hires at parent Publicis, including former Leo Burnett Chicago hand Sergio Lopez who has become global head of production.

She’ll be working alongside chief creative officer Britt Nolan, following his return to the agency after a stint at DDB, on clients such as Nintendo, Bank of America and fast food joint Wingstop. ”There’s a lot of trust between Britt and production. He’s so passionate about creative and the people that make up those teams. There’s a great kind of camaraderie there and I’m excited to partner with him.”

That trust is essential to getting the job done, she says, because the best work relies on two-way conversations.

”The producer’s job, I always say, is figuring out the best way to bring an idea to life. That’s doing the research, finding the best production partners that share the same vision, but also bringing a fresh perspective and pushing the creative once it goes from paper to film or to print.

”What I’m excited to do in this role is foster a culture where we’re not just executing the work, going beyond bringing the ideas to life. Producers are great at bringing a sense of inspiration to creatives to show how things can get done.”

Adapting production

Production was, naturally, heavily affected by Covid. ”We were faced with how to shoot remotely, how to get stuff done in a hybrid situation. Every step of the way, production was able to solve and thrive. And as we got into it, the work stood up to the circumstances we were dealing with and we were able to execute some really exceptional work during that time.”

She says that working through that period ”proved that ingenuity in our ability to create work, no matter the circumstances, is possible”.

The actual work itself has changed significantly, too, and Geisheker’s team are now expected to be able to produce barnstorming creative on-set, on location and on a multitude of platforms.

”We have clients that are already thinking about how we can show up in the metaverse, how it makes sense to be in the metaverse, how we can utilize NFTs. We should always be on the forefront of figuring out how to live in that space. It’s new, it’s really exciting and I think we’ll start doing the work and figuring out what’s more successful, based on the creative, to live in that world.”

Production, though, has been a key area for agencies to meet their sustainability promise (Leo Burnett’s parent company Publicis, for example, has pledged to reach net-zero within eight years). Given the enormous environmental impact of blockchain technologies, which include NFTs, should production teams embrace the practice?

Geisheker thinks the jury is still out. ”I know there is an impact. I’m curious to see how it continues to evolve as we learn more about what that impact is.”

Filming on location is gradually coming back, Geisheker says, and hopefully for good. ”We’ve been starting to go out. Some situations are still remote, but for the most part producers are starting to get back out there and on set.”

One net benefit of pandemic-era working life, she says, is that production teams have joined creative conversations earlier on, helping to cushion the workload producers often face. The key, she says, is ”being part of the conversation early on, not waiting until something is sold in”.

”Bringing production in earlier isn’t necessarily more work. If you’re part of the conversation earlier on you can help along the way, which has a better impact on workloads. Producers are able, as creative thinkers, to work with you every step of the way. That’s going to make for a more well-rounded view of a project, versus it being a burden.

”If we have crew, thinkers and makers who approach production and creative in parallel, we’re going to be able to figure our how to make really culturally relevant, disruptive ideas. One of my biggest goals in this new role is to foster that environment.”

Content Production Agencies Agency Culture

More from Content Production

View all

Trending

Industry insights

View all
Add your own content +