We arrived at One Infinite Loop a couple hours early

…Who could blame us – we were meeting with Steve Jobs.

It was 2004 and I was with three colleagues from BMW and its’ ad agency Fallon. We had prepared a marketing program to promote a new feature that allowed the iPod  to seamlessly be controlled by the car’s stereo and steering wheel. This was an industry first at the time. And BMW had the pole position to launch it first.

We used the extra time before the meeting to prep.  The iPod product manager Stan warned us that Steve would want to be sure that the people with whom he was meeting knew their shit – inside and out. As we approached the meeting time, we were moved to another room, in another building where Steve’s office and conference room were housed. It was like going to meet an Emperor of sorts. Soon, when we were mere minutes from the meeting time, we were told that Steve was wrapping up with some others and will be ready soon.  I took a deep breath.  Then another. 

The doors to the conference room opened.  A team of suits walked out followed by Steve.  They shook ands, took a photo and Steve’s attention turned to us when he was told, “the guys from BMW are here.”  He was excited and came to us extending his hand to say hello.  I felt his presence immediately.  When I shook his hand, it was clear he was human like the rest of us.

 We went into the large, window filled conference room.  It was bright and simple.  The birch wood table had room for 30, seated comfortably in high leather back chairs.  There were only seven of us in the meeting. Steve sat on one side in the middle of the table.  I quickly went around to the other side, directly across from him. His questions started immediately, jumping between the technology limitations and features of the new offering.  I answered as quickly as he asked, in part to demonstrate that we knew our shit.  After a few minutes of the best business volleying of my career, he said, “OK, let’s see the campaign.  Within minutes of seeing the work, he had his feet on his chair and was sitting on his heels to get closer. At one point he got up, ran out of the room and returned with another product person saying, “you’ve got to see this, it’s so cool!”

It was great to see that kind of uninhibited enthusiasm.

Toward the end of the hour-long meeting, we were presenting a radio script to Steve.  Everything was presented to Steve.  I watched Steve’s eyes drift toward the ceiling. Then he started mumbling to himself. He was somewhere else.  Where did he go? A minute or so went by when Steve came back to the meeting, mentally.  He broke the silence but sharing a formula he had worked out in his head.  If the average time someone commutes in their car is about 20 minutes each way, they spend 200 minutes each week commuting.  If you take that out a year and then divide it by the average length of a song (about 4 minutes) and number of songs on an album (about 12), then the person with the new BMW iPod Adaptor would be able to enjoy 2500 different songs or 208 albums on their way to work each year.

Wow, he just boiled the new devise down to a compelling consumer benefit.

We went back and forth on the creative and planned media placements.  He had insightful comments throughout, commenting on the key to making the message resonate.  By the end of the meeting, Steve even offered that Apple would contribute funds to the campaign so we could promote it nationally on TV. We were told beforehand that this was never going to happen.  But, Steve wanted to do it, so it happened. 

Steve had rules, which he broke when needed.

At one point, Steve criticized some of BMW’s automotive designs.  I was surprised that he went there since it was not relevant to the program nor was it the way to “woo” a partner. 

But, Steve spoke his mind. He was human after all.