The Mekanism Guarantee: They Engineer Virality

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WORKING BLUE: The partners (topless and vulnerable) and fellow Mekanistas at the Victoria Theater in San Francisco's Mission district. From left, CEO Pete Caban, director Ian Kovalik, president Jason Harris, and founder and creative director Tommy Means | Photograph by Peter Rad

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Freaks and Geeks

Spending time with the partners from Mekanism can be perplexing. I wake up after a night out in San Francisco with the crew to find the following scrawled in my notebook:

99 problems and a bitch ain't one
Nude suits
4 elf outfits
4 space helmets
8 Chinese girls doing blow

Searching for clarity, I call Katie Matson, who runs the New York operation for the production/ad shop. It could be one of two things, she says, "either an inventory of our storage closet or a shopping list for our Christmas party."

Turns out it is the latter, though I'm not sure the Chinese girls were really part of the plan. When I mention it to Tommy Means, Mekanism's founder and creative director, he's unapologetic: "Nothing pumps company morale like the four founders dancing at the holiday party in nude suits and space helmets." (fastcompany.com/nudesuits)

I first met Means and Mekanism president Jason Harris in October when they visited Fast Company's New York office. Their Web site had intrigued me -- a collection of absurdist tableaux set against black backgrounds, which includes this description: "We sprinkle our love of good storytelling on viral campaigns, commercials, and branded entertainment to inspire measurable brand loyalty."

With only a small band of regular employees -- just 40 staffers -- Mekanism has built a reputation as marketing's twisted troubadours, with a particular talent for attracting the wandering eye of the fickle youth market. But "part of the misconception of Mekanism is that we're just king of the dick jokes," says Matson, who cuts her own hair and drives a convertible 1970 Chevy Impala. "And we are the king of the dick jokes -- it's good to be king -- but there is something much deeper happening."

In fact, while Mekanism is justly known for its fratty ribaldry, the company is behind the Web campaigns of some pretty sober clients. For Microsoft, it created a series of short features starring then up-and-coming comedian Demetri Martin that introduced 5 million people to ill-fated Vista; for Frito-Lay's Tostitos, the work was built around a not-for-profit group called NOLAF.org (National Organization for Legislation Against Fun) and pulled in 3.5 million views; and for Unilever's Axe, a series of short, saucy videos illustrating how the soap removes the residue of a louche lifestyle generated more than 6 million video views and more than a million visits to a Web site built by Mekanism. The company even got the X Games crowd to care about the Olympics with its "Can You Beat an Olympic Athlete" campaign, which pitted the likes of Michael Phelps, Lindsey Vonn, and Rafael Nadal against regular folks and celebrities in Hula-hoop and egg-toss contests; the spots drove chatter across blogs, Twitter, Facebook, MySpace, and YouTube and pulled in 4 million video views as well as coverage from The New York Times and the Today show -- all without spending a dollar on traditional media.

"There isn't anyone else like us," brags Means, an Atlanta native who sounds like Michael Stipe, looks like a young Jack Nicholson, and has killed a wild boar with his bare hands (fastcompany.com/hogumentary). Means (his grandfather coined his own Ford dealership's slogan, By all means see Al Means) explains that while Mekanism bills itself as a production company, it's really a hybrid of an advertising agency, production house, and multimedia content factory that has dialed into the low cost of entry and pervasiveness of the Web. Mekanism's mission, he says, is not to overthrow the 30-second spot (they love TV dollars), but to place the Web at the center of all advertising, exploiting it to make marketing cheaper, faster, and more effective -- across all platforms. "We are the model for what the future of an agency is going to look like," Means says.

At the close of our first meeting, I ask Means and Harris, "What is it about Mekanism that makes it different? And the answer shouldn't be viral marketing, because this magazine has been writing about that since 1996."

In a slightly Tourettian outburst, Harris replies, "We can engineer virality." Awkward silence. "We guarantee we can create an online campaign and make it go viral."

Rising to the bait, I propose a little wager: Prove it. If Mekanism creates a viral campaign for Fast Company, I will document the process from conception to launch -- in the magazine to start and then online. We'll loose their baby on the world and see how far it travels, with readers right there either to marvel at its genius or mourn its genetic deficiencies.