Kintz devotes advertising career to helping other businesses grow

Sally Kintz, and her husband Steve, have worked together in order to build their dream house on their rural acreage south of Clarksville. While some of the work has been outsourced, they have completed much of the work themselves. The project has been a time-honored labor of love. Sally is owner of Poole Communications in Hannibal. Contributed photo

MARY LOU MONTGOMERY

Sally Kintz began her role as an “influencer” long before the noun had social media connotations.

As the torque behind the Hannibal-based advertising agency, Poole Communications, Sally has roots in the business that run deeper than all of the social media chat rooms that have evolved since the advent of personal computing.

While keeping up with ever-evolving technology during her three-plus decades in the marketing and advertising business, her roots actually date back to the ink-on-paper era.

She first stepped into the realm of commercial art while a senior in high school, studying under Wes Sodermeyer, a vocational technical instructor who had worked at various advertising agencies in Seattle, where Sally grew up.

“He taught us so much,” she said, including hand calligraphy, illustrations, and how to prep things for printing. Those were the predominant tools of the advertising industry in the days before the introduction of personal computers.

She completed the two-year vo-tech course in one year, she said.

Sally won a regional competition, then a state contest. The state win came with a scholarship to travel to Florida for the national competition.

The project that won in Washington state was an advertisement for 7-Up. 

“When I went to nationals, I was given the lemon industry, and I did a kiss mark on the lemon. I did a three-color design instead of two color, so I got kicked out. They counted black as a color.”

She remained philosophic, however. “It was a really good experience.”

First ‘Mac’

On her first day of class at the vo-tech school, while still a teen, her instructor asked a fellow student to show Sally around. That student’s name was Darcy, and she and Sally have maintained a close friendship ever since.

Later, Darcy’s husband, Joel McNamara, was working for a small company in Seattle named Microsoft.

“He encouraged me to buy a McIntosh computer, and explained to me how it works.

“It was expensive. I had to save money for so long to get it. It was around $2,000. Which is what they cost now!”

“The computer had a hard disk drive that had 50 megabites of space. The program would fit on a floppy disk and there was space left on it that you could put other stuff.”

Throughout her decades-long advertising career, Sally remains true to McIntosh. “I’ve been working with these darn things since the 1980s. They are really the industry standard for graphic design and illustration.”

When Sally was living in Idaho, she met Richard Michael Poole, a Navy officer, and a a native of Marion County, Mo. They married.

When he was transferred to Connecticut, “I saved my money and drove across country. We moved up and down the east coast and I worked at different ad agencies.

“I loved moving around and seeing different places,” she said.

Following his tour of duty, Richard and Sally moved to Missouri.

“My son, Richard, was 3 months old when we moved here,” she said. They drove across country in a  Volkswagen van and  camped all the way.

“We started farming, and bought a piece of land next to his parents. I stayed home and helped around the farm. We built a Grade A dairy from scratch. We built a barn and silos.

“The dairy was going really good, but not making very much money. Our milk was so clean, the inspector came out and watched us milk the cows. We just washed our cows off before we started milking.”

They also had 100 goats on their small farm. “We figured out ways to do it.”

Then, in August 1993, tragedy struck. Their son died as the result of a fall from a horse. 

“We were married for 10 years; together 12 years all together,” she said.

“When Richard died, my whole marriage fell apart.”

Sally moved to Palmyra.

Office opening

St. Elizabeth’s Hospital, previously consolidated with Hannibal’s historic Levering Hospital, closed its doors on Virginia Street in 1993, and re-emerged as Hannibal Regional Hospital. The new medical campus was constructed upon acreage annexed into Hannibal proper in order to accommodate the new health care complex.

In the meantime, Sally, as a trained and experienced commercial artist, was operating a freelance marketing business, conducted out of her home.

Working with Julie Leverenz, Sally designed a logo and branding for the new hospital.

“We did all kinds of stuff for the hospital; we had a good time working together.

“As part of my salary, they gave me a place to work,” in the old hospital building. “I worked out of the old gift shop, that was my first office.

“We did logos and illustrations. We did the logo for the (James Cary) Cancer Center, the NEMO Ambulatory Care Center; and I did lots and lots of advertising for different companies.”

Ultimately, “the hospital started taking advertising internally.”

Sherri Steinmann, who was then an account representative KHMO-Radio, “suggested I open a full service agency.

“I moved into the bottom level of the old Standard Printing building; they had just renovated it when I moved in. We had quite a few employees” by then, “and we were really busy. I went from art and illustration and design to a full service agency.

“We had started building websites; we were one of the first in the area to do that.” Some people said that websites were trendy, but Sally didn’t let that deter her. “Since my family was in Seattle, I could see what was going on there. I was fortunate enough to be able to bring new ideas here. I used email before a lot off people did.

“I tried to stay on top of technology,” she said.

Eventually, she purchased the old Rendlen Law building at 108 North Third St., and moved her business into this new location. Out of respect for entrepreneurs in need of start-up offices, she reserves incubator space on the building’s second floor. “I think it is important.”

Colllege bound

At the time she was working in office space inside the old St. Elizabeth’s Hospital building, a new renter opened shop: Moberly Area Community College.

Sally started taking classes at the community college, one at a time as her finances allowed.

She was on the committee that acquired a new MACC campus for Hannibal, all the while taking the classes she needed in order to obtain an associate’s degree. After completing classes at the community college, she enrolled at Columbia College, where in 2013 she earned dual bachelor's degrees in international business and management. “I wanted to do something that could help my company,” she said.

During the early years of Poole Communications, she expanded her business presence to Marshall and Poplar Bluff. When Covid surfaced, she closed those offices and instead retrenched into Hannibal.”

In xxxx she was married to Steve Kintz. “He’s a really good man and I’m blessed.

“Our house is south of Clarksville, a hilly bluff area. We are building a really cool house with cedar siding and rock. We are finishing up the inside.”

For six years she was a professor at Culver-Stockton College. Now that she has stepped back from the instructor role, she has more time to devote to her family life and painting. 

“I’m trying to figure out how to work in a regular painting schedule, that is my big love.

Business advice

Her focus, since opening her communications has been about watching other companies grow.

“One of the first things I tell people is don’t name the company after yourself. Businesses will sell better if it is a generic name.” 

Then, start working to build a good logo that will stand the test of time. Figure out where the company wants to go and build a logo that will last.

When offering advice to her customers, she asks: “What do you think about this? Bounce ideas back and forth; I’m a marketing department and a business consultant. I love watching a company grow and do well. That is so exciting to me.”

Finally, she pays homage to key business leaders “who helped me along the way.” She specifically named Stevens Plowman, Branson Wood, Eddie Foxall, “and so many people who were really kind and really nice to help me grow as a person and as a company.”