Story of how MMRF CEO Robert Lorsch helped put Microsoft and
Windows on the map....
Begun in 1979, COMDEX, the computer distributors’ exhibition, had become the scene, where industry go-getters had to be, and where opinion makers and trendsetters gathered in full force to see and be seen. By 1983, it was a huge phenomenon, and with all that ballyhoo, it was very difficult for any company, much less a small upstart like Microsoft, to be noticed at all.
Once Hanson knew that Microsoft would launch Windows at COMDEX, the entire communications department embarked on a mad frenzy. Gates had made it perfectly clear that the launch of Windows was the Super Bowl, and Gate didn’t want to play… he wanted to win. Knowing that, Hanson’s goal was two-fold: to make Windows a Phenomenon, and to create the buzz in the industry with Microsoft. Immediately, they faced huge obstacles.
For starters, all of Las Vegas was booked solid.
Hanson called Bob Lorsch, a marketing mastermind, with a Los Angeles-based sales promotion agency whom Hanson had used in crisis mode at Neutrogena.
Hanson said, “ I need to own Las Vegas during this event. I don’t care what the rules are. We need to rise above the clutter.”
Then Hanson warned his team, “We’re never going to get this done working through the normal channels. The normal channels are all taken. I mean this is an insane launch plan. I need to bring in somebody who can make the impossible happen. And you need to trust me. This guy is going to scare you because he is a little off the wall.”
When people showed up in Las Vegas, they were awestruck. There wasn’t a taxi on the Strip not promoting Windows. Stickers were all over the back seats of cabs; the drivers wore Windows buttons.
These same buttons were handed out at the booths of every hardware manufacturer that supported Windows. Each button had a number on it. If people could find someone else with a number that matched theirs, they could go to the Microsoft booth together and receive software, gifts and a bombast of Windows hype. In a Disnyesque mode, Lorsch also created wuppies—little fuzzy mice holding Windows flags—to promote Microsoft’s new mouse.
Lorsch was a magician who believed anything was possible and simply wouldn’t take no for an answer. He managed to get Windows 1.0 pillowcases placed in 20,000 Las Vegas hotel rooms. When half-asleep COMDEX attendees turned down their beds at night, they were astonished to find their pillows instructing them to stop by Microsoft’s booth. Windows 1.0 marketing materials were subversively slipped under hotel doors. Every day, during the entire week of COMDEX, Microsoft had new and different promotional materials delivered to the hotel rooms.
Microsoft’s competitors were crazed, but Gates and his marketing crew were ecstatic. People couldn’t go to bed without Windows. Microsoft had a Windows sign right outside the front lobby of the Las Vegas Convention Center. Microsoft was dancing in the end zone.
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Board of Advisors:
Arthur M. Kassel-Chief of Law Enforcement Services,
California State Department of Mental Health
Buzz Aldrin, Ph.D.- NASA Astronaut
Bradley S. O'Leary- Political Strategist, Author and
President, Associated Television News
Richard A. Gephardt- Former House Minority Leader
Senior Executive, Goldman Sachs
Dr. James L. Spigarelli- CEO and President, Midwest Research Institute
The Honorable Daniel Goldin- Former NASA Administrator
JJ Virgin- Health Correspondent and Nutritionist
C. Rowland Hanson- Executive with Microsoft, Neutrogena, Nautilus and other corporations
"Sugar" Ray Leonard
Asa Hutchinson - Former Congressman and Under Secretary, Homeland Security
