Success Quote by Leo Burnett

Burnett is selling advertising by insisting it isnt a factory job. In the early-to-mid 20th century, American business culture was drunk on assembly lines, standardization, and the promise that efficiency could solve anything. Advertising agencies sat awkwardly in that world: they were commercial outfits, but their raw material was attention, desire, and identity. This quote is a bid to protect that messy, creative terrain from being measured like output per hour.

The intent is partly internal, a pep talk to creatives and clients alike: dont treat us like interchangeable vendors. Burnett frames agency work as "warmly and immediately human", a phrase that tries to launder commerce through intimacy. He knows advertising is often accused of manipulation, so he reframes it as empathy: understanding "needs, wants, dreams and hopes" sounds almost therapeutic, not transactional. That is the subtextual move: the adman as human interpreter, not huckster.

The line about the "product" not being assembly-line made is also strategic self-defense. If ads are artisanal, then they justify higher fees, longer timelines, and the mystique of talent. Burnett isnt rejecting industry; he is claiming a premium category within it. Creativity becomes the moat.

Theres a quieter cynicism embedded here, too. By naming dreams and hopes as inputs, Burnett admits what advertising truly manufactures: not goods, but meanings attached to goods. He offers a flattering story about the business because it works on the same principle his industry uses on consumers: make the product feel human, and the transaction feels less like a transaction.