Meet Shane Hutton

Today we’d like to introduce you to Shane Hutton.

Hi Shane, thanks for sharing your story with us. To start, maybe you can tell our readers some of your backstory.
I was born in a small town in Canada. My dad worked in construction. I am a co-founder of an ad agency in Los Angeles called Arcana Academy.

In a high school marketing class, we had to take three ads we like and say why we like them. Then we had to take three ads we don’t like and remake them into ads we like. I enjoyed the assignment and got a good grade, so I asked my teacher if people can make money doing this. He said, “Yes. Ad people can do pretty well.” So I decided then and there that’s what I would do. I don’t have the hands for construction.

I didn’t even attempt to get into an expensive University I knew I couldn’t pay for. I went to a community college near my parent’s house instead. Part of that course required completing an unpaid internship. I found one at JWT in Toronto, which was a big global agency now called Wonderman Thompson. I met Creative Director Marcy Ruby there and they asked to see my portfolio. I didn’t have one. They said I needed one to get a job in the creative department. I asked them if they could show me what a portfolio looked like. They thought I was joking and laughed. Then they realized I wasn’t and they showed me what one looked like. To this day, I appreciate it.

After college, I made a portfolio and banged on doors for about a year and a half before I got another unpaid internship at Ogilvy & Mather Direct in Toronto. I wrote direct mail flyers. After about six months unpaid I was finally hired. My starting salary was $16,800 a year. I thought I was rich.

After a couple of years at Ogilvy the IKEA client asked their creative agency, Roche McCauley & Partners, now Roche Lowe to hire me. I was there for two years before I got an opportunity to interview with Lance Jensen at Arnold Worldwide in Boston for a writing position on the Volkswagen account. I got that job somehow. I applied for a TN-Visa which was is a work visa annually re-issued at the discretion of Border Agents.

After five years on VW at Arnold, Lance opened Modernista! and sent me an email that said, “Luke. Join the Dark Side. – Lord Vader” So, I did.

I was at Modernista! for nine years working as a Creative Director on HUMMER, Cadillac, MTV, and Budweiser. In that time, I was under an H1-B but wanted something more stable and applied for an EB-1. Because a lot of that work was so famous, I got the EB-1. I became a U.S. citizen a few years after that.

After Monderinsta! I made some mistakes. I quit smoking weed, got married, and moved to Amsterdam. I probably should have done that in a different order. But my wife and I had a great time there before moving to Chicago, where I got a spot as Senior Vice President Creative Director at one of the biggest agencies in the world, Leo Burnett.

I met Lee Walters at Leo Burnett and after a couple of years and some very bad blizzards in Chicago, we both realized we wanted to start our own agency and that we wanted to do that in Los Angeles. So in 2011, we started Arcana Academy at the border of Venice and Culver City and are now narrowly regarded as the most respected independent ad agency in the country* (*within 400 yards of a Costco.)

We all face challenges, but looking back would you describe it as a relatively smooth road?
Does anyone ever say, “Yeah, I had a smooth road. My parents set me up with fat stacks and made sure they connected me to all the right people?” I’m guessing they don’t. But I’m also guessing it was smoother for most people than is currently fashionable to admit.

Looking back, I would have to say it was pretty smooth. I haven’t had any health challenges for example. I set a trajectory and I followed it. The trajectory I set was just a difficult one. So the whole journey is a challenge.

Advertising is an extremely demanding industry. It’s hard to get into. It devours your time. It feasts on your energy. And consumes your mind. There is no rest in this business. It changes too fast. You miss birthdays, weddings, and funerals. The problems change constantly and so does the audience. So every single day is a challenge. And that’s not hyperbole. You win some and you lose more. Agencies are hired and fired every day.

But I would say the biggest challenge is understanding the difference between art an advertising.

Advertising is artistic but it’s not art. In advertising a lot of artists fail because they don’t know the difference.

With art, any audience that reacts to your work, they feel something can be called a success. But in advertising every audience has to have the same reaction to your work. And they can’t just feel it, they need to act on it. That’s a whole different beast.

So advertising really forces you to kill your ego. Delivering creative on demand while maintaining a high standard of integrity requires you to bury your ego. It isn’t about you. It never was. You don’t deserve any more than you’ve earned. You’re only as good as your last campaign. And nobody is going to come and save you. You can cry in the car on the way home later if you want, but right now you need to solve this and make people love the solution. It’s equal parts science, art, and voodoo. That’s just not something a lot of people can do consistently.

Thanks for sharing that. So, maybe next you can tell us a bit more about your work?
I’m an advertising writer. I make creative content for any media channel from Social Media to the Super Bowl.

I specialize in creating communications platforms for brands and executing all creative touch points that feed from that platform.

I am mostly known for my automotive work. One of my commercials ignited the posthumous career of singer/songwriter Nick Drake and has been chronicled in the music book series 33 1/3. I have won over 167 international awards for my advertising including a Cannes Lion, a Clio, One Show, D&AD, and I have received an Emmy Nomination. My work has been in the Museum of Modern Art in NYC nine times as part of a permanent canon called “The Art and Technique of the American Television Commercial.” My work has appeared in college textbooks as well as a book called, “Pick Me: Breaking Into Advertising and Staying There.”

What I love most about my work is seeing how what I do creatively can measurably influence audience behavior in a tangible commercial way that creates and sustains jobs for folks like my dad.

Do you have any memories from childhood that you can share with us?
It’s hard to choose a favorite childhood memory. Picking wild raspberries with my dog. Making a ramp out of plywood and jumping my bike over a ditch. Building forts alone in the forest. Netting suckerfish in the creek near my house. Jumping off the roof into snowdrifts in the winter. Passing notes back and forth under the doors when my sister and I were sent to our rooms for misbehaving. The “nifty lunches” my mom would make if school was suddenly canceled, which were basically little bits of whatever we had in the fridge. You might call it Redneck Charcuterie nowadays. Those are all good memories for me. But my favorite is probably just laughter. Our house wasn’t filled with a whole lot, but it was always filled with that.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.arcanaacademy.com/about-us
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/arcana_academy/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ArcanaAcademy/
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/2851643/admin/
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC_X84xKdnfmRVm_BuWp5SxA
• Other: https://balloonbrigade.org