Titan 90’s ad-man now realizes the real prize was his children all along
Archie Liebowitz, 53, spent most of his life clawing his way to the top and taking whatever wasn’t nailed down. Making a name for himself by coming up with some of the most memorable campaigns of the 90’s, Archie now sits atop a great empire built by fruit snacks and adding the word “x-treme” in front of products. What he would soon discover, though, was that happiness wasn’t found in a private jet, signing bonus, or an off the books massage parlor; but right in front of him all along.
Archie Liebowitz lays on the ground of corner office with a little blood staining his wrinkled collared shirt. He rolls around the floor murmuring of his throwing up in an Uber with a group of Thai lady-boys before telling me when he started at Prospect Consulting LLC in the summer of 1992. “Cocaaaaine.” He rambled to Premium Jargon. “Everything was women, drugs, loud music, and taking money from people who didn’t deserve it. We were on a roll and nobody could stop us. Company comes up to us and is like how do we sell these pouches of expired army kool aid? Prospect says ‘call it Capri Sun and say it will turn you into silver goop that skateboards’. Another one comes to us with some berries they grew in a lab that are arguably low grade plastic. Boom. We call ‘em Gushers and make commercials where kids’ heads turn into fruit. We did that cause there was a real possibility the lab berries would do that, but luckily they didn’t.”
Archie scoops up a mostly empty bottle of rye and looks out to the city longingly. “After all those massive successes you think I would have been able to do what our commercials said and ‘totally gnarl out’ so I could enjoy my budding family. However with every success came partying and subsequent lost time with my family.” Archie lifts his shirt to show a scar stretching across his abdomen. “I got this in San Paolo from a pimp who thought I was getting too handsy with one of his gostosas. We had just signed Gogurt and were on a 3 day celebration bender. In those three days I missed two of my daughter’s soccer games, and my 12th wedding anniversary. For what? I’ve seen more hookers die from overdoses in a shady hotel than I have junior varsity basketball games.”
Archie pulls out his wallet to show me a picture of his son now. “We barely talk now. I asked him if he wanted to get some half off apps at Applebee’s and stared me down and said ‘Millennials HATE Applebee’s dad.’ Can you imagine hating Applebee’s? I ask you, what ever happened to eating good in the neighborhood? What happened to eating good in the neighborhood?”
Since talking to PJ, Archie now lives in a studio apartment in lower Manhattan. With the kids grown and his wife gone to live with her new husband, a dentist from long island named ‘Mitch’, Archie has been plotting a way to win them back. He’ll have to come up with his most ambitious rebranding strategy yet, to turn a drug-addled overweight and out of touch gen x’er, into a loving father and emotionally available husband, to the x-treme.
