It’s important to make stuff. It’s more important to make stuff you are passionate about. At Deutsch LA’s all agency off-site meeting this summer, the partners introduced a new program called the App Drive that helps us all build more stuff we love.

The idea behind App Drive is simple: Come up with a great digital idea, and Deutsch will make it happen. On Wednesday August 8, Deutsch held its first official App Drive, where 11 brave souls got up and pitched ideas in front of a panel of jurors—oh, and everyone else in the agency.

The brief was to use digital technologies in a low cost way to solve a problem for a group of people. The ideas had to solve one of these problems: (1) monetize the ideas we don’t make (2) measure and impact employee happiness, or (3) choose a small group and solve a problem for them. Ideas ranged from a scale that detects when the M&Ms are running low around the office, to an auto body estimate tool. (I’m personally pulling for the M&Ms app.)

While they all accrued oohs and ahhs from the audience, we aren’t able to produce them all. But with the help of Deutsch, six of these digital ideas will be pushed forward into development. I can’t reveal more at the moment, but I promise to keep you posted!

2012-08-20