Floren left Minneapolis-based Martin Williams in 2001 after 33 years there.
“In the mid-’90s, the agency had about 300 people and had just gotten a lot of new business. Volkswagen was screening agencies, and we were one of them. During the pitch process, we visited Volkswagen dealerships around the country and found they were angry about the advertising and how they were being treated. The longer we thought about this, we thought, ‘If we get that account, it will really change the culture at the agency.’ We decided to pull out . . . . The agency that won it was catapulted onto the national scene.
“I learned . . . that dealers are always angry; they always want more of the advertising money to flow to the local, not national, level. I learned that any great opportunity comes with a certain amount of risk; and if you’re going to be a leader, you have to pull your organization through that. After that lesson, any time we got an opportunity to do something like that, we all realized we had to go for it. You can’t be in that business and be timid.”
