GTE Spacenet

CD/CW: Peter Burkhard   AD: Jim Kingsley     DDB/Needham 

Before the Internet (!) digital data flowed through fiber optic cable until it got within a mile or so of a computer. The last leg was usually copper wire, which tended to garble bytes of Vital Information.

GTE Spacenet offered a turnkey alternative - satellite transmission.

CEO's didn't understand satellites, but they did understand the value of Vital Information.

This campaign opened with a three-page inside cover spread in Fortune, Forbes, US News & World Report and Newsweek. There were 8 or so ads in the campaign.

It led directly to a half dozen presentations of $40 million systems.

One day the chairman of GTE corporate noticed the word "War" at the bottom of an ad with his logo on it, and exclaimed, "We are in the telephone business! What if a little old lady in Ohio read this ad in Fortune? Why, we'd lose a customer! Kill it."