TBWA founding member Wiesendanger in Zurich
TBWA\Zurich had long wanted to invite Uli Wiesendanger, one of the founders of TBWA, to Zurich to learn more about the agency’s history. On October 3, the time had finally come.
Wiesendanger presented himself to the numerous audience members from the agency and clientele. It was an exhilarating moment when Uli Wiesendanger took to the stage at Café Che and shared insights into his life story in conversation with Radio Zürisee Managing Director Tony Immer. Uli Wiesendanger, the W of TBWA, originally started his career after graduating from high school with a commercial apprenticeship at an agency in Zurich. His career was shaped, among other things, by a subsequent detour to PKZ, where he was able to deal intensively with good advertising on the client side for the first time. He soon moved on to Young & Rubicam in Frankfurt, New York and Paris. And this soon brought him together with strategic thinker Bonnange, businessman Tragos and service-oriented Airoldi. The vision was soon clear: to build a network with little financial outlay that would be active worldwide from day one.
TBWA was founded in Paris in 1970, and other offices such as Milan, Frankfurt and London were immediately added. In Germany, Michael Conrad was even hired in the first phase, and John Hegarty in England. Thus the company development took its course and soon TBWA could be counted among the largest networks in the world. In 1998, the founders decided to sell to Omnicom.
Uli Wiesendanger left the inspiring impression that one might expect from him. As a Swiss, and at the same time creative, to set out into the big world, to found a network with a big vision, takes courage, pragmatism and a lot of joy in what you do. And he has retained this passion to this day and was able to convey it well last Friday.
