Phil Kotler

Several years ago, I wrote a review of Kotler's Marketing Places. Okay, okay, okay, it was a bit harsh. But, hey, he's big enough to take a bit of a pasting. The editor of the journal, however, wasn't so sure and my review had to go through two sets of libel lawyers before it appeared in print. Ahem.

Anyway, I decided to reproduce the piece in Postmodern Marketing Two. Purely for scholarly purposes, you understand. I wasn't sticking the boot in, or anything. When I submitted the manuscript to International Thomson, the then editor expressed his concern about the Kotler review. Naturally, I explained to him that it had already undergone legal scrutiny and everything was hunky-dory. He seemed less than convinced by my assurances, though he agreed to let it stand.

You'll never guess what happened next. I received a pre-publication copy of PM2 some time later and, lo and behold, the copyright page contained a very curious statement denying all legal liability re. the contents of the said volume! Check it out. They never sent me the proofs of this particular page but it was blatantly obvious, to even a simpleton like me, that International Thomson were doing their utmost to distance themselves from the thing.

As you can imagine, I was a tad perturbed, especially as it was too late to make any changes. The book was already printed. So I decided to take the bull by the horns and I sent a copy of the text to Prince Philip himself. The great man cast his eye over my slanderous attack on his work - I guess he didn't see the review first time round - and responded as a true titan should. You'll have to be a lot more abusive than that, sonny, if you want to upset me. The perfect riposte. What a guy!

So, with a challenge like that, what else could I do but raise the stakes.  I wrote a piece called “Kotler is Dead!” and shamelessly used my influence as special issue editor to get it published in EJM.  Naturally, I wrote it under a pseudonym – the sainted Alan Smithee – and, although it upset numerous worthy but dull marketing academics, Kotler himself loved it.  He wanted to reprint part of it in one of his books and asked me for permission.  I denied any knowledge of the author.  “Alan Smithee?  Never heard of him!” 

Actually, I eventually got to meet Phil when I spent most of 2001 in Kellogg.  Our first meeting was, well, nothing if not memorable.  Singularly appropriate too.  I’d been in Kellogg for a couple of months but hadn’t actually encountered the great man.  Then, one happy day, while I was happily chatting to the departmental secretary, the door of his corner office suddenly opened and the guru’s guru appeared.  He was looking for a telephone directory, which just happened to be sitting on a little low table immediately in front of me.  He bent over to pick up the book and presented his (ample) posterior to your humble scribe.  I didn’t know whether to kiss his ass or kick his ass.  However, I considered his gesture deeply symbolic.  There was no need for me to speak with him thereafter.  He had said all he needed to say to me and said it most eloquently.

Despite the above, we did meet up and got on fairly well, believe it or not.  I tell the story of our luncheon in Time, Space and the Market.  I also wrote an article on his literary style, which he quite enjoyed apart from a couple of interpretive quibbles.  We subsequently clashed in the august pages of HBR, which was fun.  Better yet, he appears in The Marketing Code, albeit in fictional form.  Not only did he give me permission to portray him as “the bad guy” but he even wrote an endorsement for the front cover.  What a man!