In the beginning was the word. My father was a typographer in the ad game and he was always at his drawing board creating words from the time I was born.  

     My theory is that I copied his enthusiasm for his task from my earliest days. I was reading everything by the time I was four. My Christmas present when I was 6 was a miniature printing press with a font of all-cap rubber letters.

      What is a copywriter. Inside the ad game, it was an exalted title. The apex creator of the ad. Today it means the guy who writes the captions. The copywriter is no longer a part of the design process. The Design Committee will let you know when the design is finalized, and then we’ll be ready for text.  

     I was a writer for print, mostly, in my early career, but then the Macintosh computer came along and I dived into it head first and within a few years I was in Silicon Valley making more money as a Mac graphics guy than as a copywriter. I did so many courtroom presentations, for instance. I thought it would be my new career.  

     Then I told my placement agency I wanted copywriting work, and started contracting for the Internet Shopping Network in 1999. Then I wrote thousands and thousands of product descriptions for Walmart.com in the 2000s.

     I wrote a lot of stuff in Santa Barbara. In Silicon Valley they were more interested in my graphics and web skills. Now that I’m semi-retired, I’m offering my copywriting services in Santa Barbara again.

     What I like to do is to absorb myself into my new client’s information, where I discover that everything I knew about the client’s niche is outmoded.