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Dossier
By Douglass Crouse, Daily Record
June 26, 2000
 What agencies do: The sister advertising/marketing firms offer a mostly Fortune 500 clientele everything from direct mailing to Web site development to television expertise, with billings exceeding $50 million last year. Always keen on adopting technological advances, Taeschler and her 72 employees have made a specialty of customer communications over the Web. "I've heard the Internet described as 'direct marketing on steroids.' It's really changing the paradigm by putting more of the power in the customer's hands."
Founded: Gráfica, in Taeschler's East Hanover basement in 1986; GráficaInter.active, incorporated in 1997 and recently moved to a separate office.
Clients: Lucent Technologies, PSEG, New Jersey Lottery, Horizon Blue Cross Blue Shield of New Jersey, and AT&T, the first and still one of the largest.
Agencies nowadays: "Bigger isn't necessarily better. Smaller organizations can often respond more quickly. You have to find the right message for different people, then prove your return."
Age: 47
Residence: Chester
Family: Husband, John, a former math and computer science teacher and now stay-at-home dad; sons John, 10, and Daniel, 8. Whence her accent? Not Brooklyn, as her Brooklyn-raised partner, John Puglionisi, believes, but Union City.
History: Worked in "every position imaginable" at a series of New York ad agencies after graduating from Rutgers University. "AT&T kept following me from agency to agency, so I figured I should try doing this myself."
The early days: "It was doing everything. You had to do all the typing (she still types with two fingers) and empty the trash. One of my clients showed up once when I was still in my pajamas."
Favorite slogans: In conversations with clients, the rule is KISS, or "Keep it simple, stupid." "Strategic imagination," a term the company has trademarked, refers to qualifying an ad's impact by measuring consumer response.
Employee hits: Bagel Mondays, summer Fridays (everyone out the door at 1 p.m.), and winter snow days. "You've got to treat your employees well with all the deadlines they have to meet in this industry."
Artist at heart: With a Bachelor's degree in Art from Rutgers University and an early passion for oil painting, she saw advertising as a way to combine personal expression with a regular paycheck. "It was the closest thing to the artist's life where you could actually make a living."
Hero: Her father, Edward, a writer who died when she was 12. "I learned from him that it didn't matter whether you were male or female. It was intelligence and a strong work ethic that made people successful. He'd always say, 'Either you do it right or you don't do it at all.'"
Reading: Says 99 percent is industry-related. Favorite is "Ogilvy on Advertising," published in 1983.
Collections: Books, teapots, and candlesticks.
Favorite restaurant: Grand Café in Morristown.
Getaway: Vacation home on Long Beach Island. "There's something magical about crossing that causeway. The sand and the ocean definitely relieve the stress."
Car: Toyota Land Cruiser, can't remember year. "It's the third one — they all become the same after a while."
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