BRITANNICA.COM
Styling Intellect for the Internet Age
Anjelica Huston, shot by Veronique Vial on location at Paradise Cove, Malibu
Account Supervisor, Deutsch Inc. At the turn of the millennium, Britannica was one of the most recognized knowledge brands in the world, but encyclopedias were rapidly losing relevance as the internet reshaped how people consumed information. The challenge was not simply bringing content online. It was redefining how intelligence, curiosity, and knowledge could live within digital culture.
Reframing a Legacy Brand
At Deutsch, I helped lead the repositioning of Britannica.com from traditional reference books and texts into something more emotionally and culturally relevant. Together with Creative Directors Bryan Black and Bill Tsapalas, we developed the platform idea: The Stylist to the World.
The strategy reframed Britannica.com as a place where intelligence, creativity, culture, and personal perspective could coexist online in a way that felt modern rather than academic.
WHAT’S ON YOUR MIND?
Directed by Mark Pellington, the campaign featured influential voices across film, music, literature, art, and sports responding to one deceptively simple question: What’s on your mind?
The executions were intentionally intimate and unscripted. We asked each subject where they did their best thinking, then filmed them in those environments through raw, minimally edited :15 and :30 spots designed to feel authentic rather than overly produced.
Francis Ford Coppola reflected from his Napa vineyard. Seal appeared in his Hollywood Hills studio. Anjelica Huston, Parker Posey, and Norman Mailer each brought their own distinct energy and perspective into the campaign.
At the same time, renowned French photographer Veronique Vial, known for her celebrated books Women Before 10 A.M. and Men Before 10 A.M., photographed each subject within those same personal environments, adding another layer of intimacy and realism to the campaign.
The work appeared across television, print, and high-profile media placements including Vanity Fair and CNBC.
Looking back, even the language itself feels ahead of its time. Years later, “What’s on your mind?” would become one of the defining prompts of the social media era, most notably through Facebook. Britannica.com was already exploring how ideas, opinions, and personal perspective could live publicly online long before that behavior became culturally normalized.
What’s on Francis Ford Coppola’s mind?
Ahead of Its Time
The project also marked an important shift in my own career.
Coming directly from BBDO, I had learned production scale and operational rigor. Deutsch introduced a much more entrepreneurial way of thinking about ideas, positioning, and cultural momentum.
My client partner, Liz Nickles, became one of the most influential mentors of my early career. Beyond strategy, she taught me how to move quickly and decisively when you know an idea is right. Rather than waiting endlessly for meetings, approvals, and internal alignment, she believed in pushing smart ideas forward quickly and bringing fully formed solutions to the table.
I still remember sitting with her on a bench at Paradise Cove in Malibu during the Anjelica Huston shoot when she looked at me and said:
“You need to get out of the agency side. You’re too quick and smart for it. It’s going to hold you back.”
That conversation stayed with me for the rest of my career.
What’s on Parker Posey’s mind?
Charitable partnership initiative
Takeaway
Looking back, the most important part of the Britannica.com project was not just the work itself. It was meeting Liz Nickles. She fundamentally changed the trajectory of my career.
Until that point, I was still operating largely within traditional agency structures and learning the mechanics of large-scale advertising. Liz introduced a much more entrepreneurial way of thinking about strategy, culture, timing, and leadership. In many ways, she gave me permission to trust my instincts, move faster when an idea felt right, and stop waiting for endless layers of approval.
That experience resonated deeply with me because even early in my career, I naturally pushed beyond traditional account management thinking. Working with Liz opened up an entirely different way of approaching business and brand strategy.
Shortly afterward, Liz recruited me to join her at Credit Suisse First Boston to help lead one of the largest global brand integration and repositioning initiatives in financial services at the time.
She was right. I did need to leave the traditional agency world.
And she was the person who helped pull me out of it.