Over the years, I’ve talked about the concept of “digital natives”—those who have grown up with the Internet always being a part of the fabric of their lives, versus “digital immigrants,” mostly Gen Xers and Boomers whose memory banks include phone booths, clock radios, and request lines.
It’s a different world today, and while many of us AARP members are trying to hang onto their executive positions, the pressure from young people is palpable—assuming they have any desire to work in our industry.
Like other legacy media and the organizations that represent them, there is a tangible changing of the guard.
Take the traditional “ad agency world,” for example. Those Don Draper Days are so far back in the rearview mirror, they are but little dots on the landscape. Today, agency types are getting their news headlines
from a couple of 27 year-old guys bucking convention with short, casual, amateur video that’s known as “60 Seconds of Advertising News.” How’s that for a creative brand name?
The guys whip through the industry news of the day on a dry erase board. They’ve done these daily reports just since January, already vaulting to “must-see video” status in spite of the institutional trade press that has covered advertising news for decades.
According to a story in the Wall Street Journal (behind a paywall) by Megan Graham, young Geno Schellenberger and Jack Westerkamp are the unlikely geniuses behind capturing the advertising zeitgeist. Their podcast, Breaking and Entering (a metaphor for working their way into the business), has become a popular stop for ad agency workers. As the two struggled to get respectable jobs in the business, their podcast (like so many of them) has a genuine feel that reveals more insights and information than other shows.
Why does it work, while so-called “serious” podcasts and other media have become run-of-the-mill and pedestrian? As Frances Webster, head of New York agency Walrus notes, “Advertising is the most fun part of (the) business. This is nothing against the other trades, who are fantastic, but (Schellenberger and Westerkamp) breathe fresh air into industry reporting.”
Breaking and Entering, according to the Journal, is holding its own financially. And now other opportunities are opening up for these guys.
As an indicator of their popularity in the industry, the duo made the trek to the Cannes Lions event in France last month. It was sponsored by Raven Public Relations who hired Schellenberger and Westerkamp to interview ad execs as part of a video series they named “Tiny Terrace Talks.”
Here’s how one of those interviews was produced:
View this post on Instagram
The message to advertisers is implicit and contradictory at the same time. In an industry that prides itself on creativity, two aging Gen Z’s have broken out as cultural spokesdudes for the business. In virtually no time at all, their genuine, humorous style has captured agency vets in ways that Ad Age never will.
Who are these guys? A couple of 27 year-old creatives who obviously don’t know better. But they’ve captured the vibe of the moment as you can see in one of their recent rundowns below. Irreverent, unprofessional, unassuming, and accessible. What’s not to like about this new model for a field long in need of staying too long in the “cheese room.” And “60 Seconds in Advertising News” looks nothing like anything that’s come before it.
View this post on Instagram
Would agency bigwigs like David Ogilvy and Leo Burnett approve of young Schellenberger and Westerkamp’s review platform? While these young guys look more like country club caddies than agency execs, they are loaded with energy and irreverence—elements often gone missing in today’s agency world.
More to the point, their instincts are solid, as is their ability to lean into video shorts and other elements common to the creative experience in 2025.
It makes you wonder why more agencies aren’t turning twentysomething interns and mailrooms loose on accounts in dire need of creative energy and attention. Schellenberger and Westerkamp have only been cranking out these humorous reports for just six months—and they’ve already generated much buzz.
And it makes you wonder…what would it be like to receive a similar report about the radio business each morning in your email box, delivered by a couple of smartass kids who don’t know any better?
I think it would be pretty cool.
Originally published by Jacobs Media
