15750: D&AD Writes Edict In Pencil For Easier Revisions…?

 

Little Black Book reported D&AD announced a full ban on Russian participation in its award contests—rethinking the initial decision to accept submissions from Russia and redirect the entry fees toward donations benefiting Ukraine.

 

Sorry, but this decision feels like bullshit coming from the exclusive ‘educational’ organization. After all, the increasing protests within Russia show that the country’s citizens are not fully supporting the invasion. The Russians vying for design trophies are likely more interested in RGB than KGB.

 

Will D&AD impose similar sanctions on other places with questionable respect for human rights? That would eliminate Egypt, China, Venezuela and more. And if systemic racism is categorized as a human rights issue, well, add the U.S. and U.K. to the detention list.

 

D&AD people who live in glass houses shouldn’t throw stone pencils.

 

D&AD Announces Ban on Russian Participation in the Awards

 

Show will impose a full ban on Russian entries into both the professional and New Blood awards

 

Following the escalating situation in Ukraine, D&AD has announced that it can no longer proceed with its original plan and are now imposing a full ban on Russian entries into both the professional and New Blood awards. 

 

D&AD has stated: “It is with heavy hearts that we announce D&AD is no longer able to accept participation from Russia in the 2022 D&AD Awards and New Blood Awards.

 

“On Monday 28 February we released a statement that we would continue to allow entries from the Russian creative community in this year’s D&AD Awards and that we would in turn be making a donation of that amount to support the Ukrainian creative community.

 

“As the conflict has continued to escalate at an alarming rate over the past week, we have reconsidered our position and have made the decision to remove all Russian entries from both of our awards shows this year and will not be able to allow participation from Russian companies or individuals.

 

“We intend to keep our lines of communication open with our Russian colleagues who oppose the war on Ukraine. We will refund their entry fees, including to students and tutors of the New Blood Awards, when it is possible to do so.

 

“We remain categorically opposed to the Russian invasion of Ukraine and the horrifying violence inflicted on the Ukrainian people.

 

“We will uphold our promise to make a donation to the Art Directors Club of Europe Ukraine if and when they are able to accept it, or alternatively to initiatives supporting displaced Ukrainian creatives.

 

“We are deeply saddened and distressed by the ongoing conflict. For those who can help, we take this opportunity to draw your attention to resources and initiatives that are already in place:

 

https://www.designersunitedforukraine.org/resources

 

https://how-to-help-ukraine-now.super.site/

15749: David Has David Ogilvy Spinning In His Grave…?

 

 

Advertising Age recently reported Burger King is putting its U.S. creative and media into play, meaning incumbent advertising agency David may get flame-broiled and fired. Incumbent media shop Horizon may be unable to hold the pickle, hold the lettuce and hold BK, Popeyes and Tim Hortons. So, what’s the message here? Ironically, the incumbent creative ad agency failed to heed the words of the industry icon that inspired their name—David Ogilvy—who declared, “If it doesn’t sell, it isn’t creative.”

 

Burger King Begins Agency Review For U.S. Creative And Media

 

Sibling chains Popeyes and Tim Hortons are also part of the U.S. media review

 

By Jessica Wohl

 

Burger King, which has struggled to lure diners despite numerous award-winning ads, is reviewing its U.S. creative and media agencies.

 

The move is a blow to creative agency David, and media agency Horizon. Burger King has worked with each of the agencies for roughly eight years. Horizon’s future with Burger King’s sibling chains Popeyes and Tim Hortons is also in question.

 

David and Horizon are both invited to join the request for proposal, Burger King announced. Burger King, through a spokesperson, said that it was “extremely grateful for the incredible partnership from David and Horizon over the years and both agencies are invited to join the RFP.”

 

“As BK continues to evolve its efforts to achieve world-class relevance with today’s guests, a thorough review of key aspects of the business will take place,” the spokesperson said.

 

ID Comms is managing the pitches.

 

The review comes as Burger King tries to boost its business with value-priced deals and other offers. The Home of the Whopper saw U.S. same-store sales, or sales at longstanding restaurants, fall 1.6% in the third quarter when Wall Street had predicted a 3.4% increase. As one analyst titled a research note about the results: “Fixing Burger King U.S. Quickly May Prove an ‘Impossible Whopper.’”

 

Whichever agency or agencies win the account have much work to do. Burger King lost its No. 2 U.S. burger chain status to Wendy’s in 2020. Burger King's U.S. measured media spending fell 22.9% to $286.8 million in 2020, according to Kantar data from the Ad Age Datacenter, as the pandemic disrupted the restaurant industry. And the marketing ranks at the chain and parent company Restaurant Brands International have been in flux.

 

In November 2021, its chief marketing officer, Ellie Doty, left after less than two years, a move the chain called a personal decision. She was replaced by interim CMO Yosef Hojchman. Doty’s departure came weeks after Paloma Azulay, global chief brand officer of Restaurant Brands International, left the company. Both of them left months after Fernando Machado, who had been Restaurant Brands International’s global chief marketing officer after serving as Burger King’s CMO, departed for Activision Blizzard in April 2021. And late last month Bruno Cardinali, Popeyes’ chief marketing officer for U.S. & Canada, left after joining the chain in early 2019, just before its massive chicken sandwich success.

 

Now, in the U.S., three major chains in Restaurant Brands’ portfolio—Burger King, Popeyes and Tim Hortons—are looking for a new media agency of record. Each has been working with Horizon.

 

Along with David on creative and Horizon on media, Burger King’s agency roster in the U.S. includes 360i on social, 500 Degrees Studio on merchandising and Alison Brod Marketing Communications (ABMC) on PR. Popeyes works with Gut, Horizon, ABMC, Hawkeye and 500 Degrees. Tim Hortons’ roster includes Horizon, 500 Degrees and ABMC.

 

Many of David’s campaigns for Burger King have been creative hits. They include last year’s ads launching BK’s Ch’King chicken sandwich, featuring the voice of Paul Giamatti and radio and video spots about these “confusing times” promoting the meatless Impossible Whopper. David also played a role in the early 2020 multi-agency, multi-award-winning hit “Moldy Whopper” about dropping artificial ingredients and preservatives from the menu. David was also the agency behind Burger King’s move to air 45 seconds of old footage of Andy Warhol eating a Whopper during the 2019 Super Bowl.

15748: Shit For Tat.

 

Grey London is responsible for this sensationalistic shit. Is former McCann Health CCO Jeremy Perrott freelancing?

 

15747: Shut Your Mouth, Racists!

 

This campaign from Brazil tells racists, “Swallow your racism.” Okay, but the typography appears to be moving out of figures’ mouths—making viewers with design skills want to throw up.

 

15746: TGIF DE&I PR BS.

 

Digiday interviewed Merkle Global Chief Equity Officer Kirt Morris, who delivered the standard status report on DE&I in Adland. That is, DE&I is DOA. Duh. It’s often stressed that CDOs should not be part of HR. All the recent hiring, editorial writing and trade journal interviewing shows they’re not HR—they’re PR.

 

‘People are over-mentored, under-sponsored’: Merkle’s global chief equity officer sounds off on ‘DE&I industrial complex’

 

By Kimeko McCoy

 

The social justice movement that reached a fever pitch after the murder of George Floyd two years ago has seemingly simmered to a dull roar across the advertising and marketing industry. Diversity, equity and inclusion numbers that agencies promised slow trickled in 2021. And much of the industry’s approach to Black History Month this year did little more than check a performative box, per previous Digiday reporting.

 

However, after a wave of hiring and promoting DE&I experts across the industry, some agencies, like Dentsu’s Merkle have tried to maintain momentum through a combination of representation and retention efforts. Kirt Morris, global chief equity officer at Merkle, began this work after stepping into the role last January. He has been with Merkle for over a decade. Digiday caught up with Morris to talk about what those efforts have looked like over the past year and the work there is still to be done.

 

This interview has been lightly edited for clarity.

 

How have you seen the workforce changes in terms of diversity, and how have you been working to change that?

 

Speaking honestly and frankly, the landscape of Merkle was predominantly white. Our executive team was predominately white and predominantly male. Dentsu has a public commitment to be 50-50, from an executive women standpoint, by the year 2025. And Merkle, as part of Dentsu, we are committed to that vision as well. We are on par to get to that goal by 2025. Because over the last couple of months, we’ve hired three executives women [Liz Rafferty, global chief people officer; Sarah Strassheim, global chief financial officer; and Sandra Swindle, global chief operating officer] in that role. I would be remiss to say we [don’t] have more work to do to have BIPOC representation at that level as well. We are working multiple angles. Not only from a recruiting standpoint to getting new talent in the door, but also recognizing the talent that’s already here as well.

 

It always seems to come full circle back to the talent-pipeline problem. How does the industry finally get past that?

 

We are diversifying the actual talent acquisition channels. We have partnerships with [The Association of Hispanic Professionals] Prospanica. We are inking a partnership with the National Black MBA Association [and HBCU Howard University]. We need to build and diversify the incoming talent at the top of the funnel. We also need to start tracking who’s getting a phone screen [interview], who’s getting an interview, who’s getting an offer, and who’s getting an actual callback.

 

Two is looking internally, identifying high-performing, high-potential women and people of color, and making sure we put our arms around them, creating programs right to elevate their voices. Once you invite these people into those programs, what happens next? The program ends and we need to continue to actually sponsor them. People are over-mentored, under-sponsored.

 

Define sponsor. What does that mean?

 

A sponsor is somebody that will advocate for you when you are not in the room. As people of color, women and other marginalized groups know, you’re typically not at that table. Having somebody that knows you well, could vouch for the work that you have done, they could advocate for you. That’s a true sponsor.

 

After the murder of George Floyd, there was a lot of talk about DE&I in the industry. Two years later, how is that holding up?

 

The attention in the industry has lulled a little bit. There’s a sense of fatigue in the machine. I call it the DE&I industrial complex. There was a lot of attention, but some folks have actually moved on. As chief diversity officers, we have to lean in and say this problem hasn’t changed from 2020, even 2021. There’s still a lot more work to do and how do we lean in as organizations? The good thing is that we are seeing clients now coming to us and saying we need to see a diverse team. If we continue to tie it to the work that we’re doing for our clients, and clients are asking us to show up in that way, that will continue the actual momentum going forward.

15745: On Coinbase, Caucasians & Crumbs.

 

Advertising Age and Inc. reported on the wailing and gnashing of teeth prompted by tweets from Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong and The Martin Agency CEO Kristen Cavallo—as well as other industry dimwits with nothing better to do than pathetically pontificate on the World Wide Web. Read either story for the dumb-ass details. A key net comment: White advertising agencies are feeling undervalued by clients.

 

Boo-fucking-hoo.

 

Suze Orman is credited with saying, “When you undervalue who you are, the world will undervalue what you do and vice versa.” The statement is completely applicable to White advertising agencies and the White holding companies that own them.

 

As White holding companies continue to engage in Corporate Cultural Collusion—serving up a buffet of White shops for clients to choose from—the end result is a commoditization of services.

 

Furthermore, when White advertising executives routinely shuttle between Caucasian companies, the end result is a commoditization of talent.

 

And finally, when the collective industry ultimately turns every engagement into a bidding war—where the lowest estimate wins the assignment—the end result is an erosion of value.

 

Cavallo even acknowledged that it is common for multiple White advertising agencies to present similar campaign concepts, confirming the commoditization of services and talent. Coinbase handing the Super Bowl project to consultancy-turned-White-advertising-agency Accenture confirms the erosion of value.

 

But what makes the Adland-wide whining from Cavallo and assorted White executives so offensive is that the crybaby theatrics were staged during Black History Month. After all, the slights experienced by White advertising agencies are nothing compared to the disregard, disrespect and discrimination—as well as crumbs—deliberately directed at minority-owned firms.

 

In short, any BHM patronizing parties and promotions performed on Madison Avenue were trumped by the blatant display of White privilege and systemic racism.

 

Coinbase’s Super Bowl Ad Controversy Sparks Call For Change On How Agencies Are Treated

 

Response by Martin Agency’s Kristen Cavallo ignites firestorm over ‘lack of respect’ for shops

 

By Brian Bonilla and Parker Herren

 

A 12-part tweet from Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong over the cryptocurrency's Super Bowl ad—and a response from The Martin Agency’s CEO Kristen Cavallo—seemingly began over credit for advertising ideas, but ended up generating an industry-wide groundswell over agency-client relationships. As agency exec after agency exec weighed in on the debate that played out over Twitter and LinkedIn, it was clear that the exchange touched a nerve within the industry: Agencies are feeling undervalued by clients.

 

It began with Armstrong taking a victory lap Monday on Twitter over the company’s QR code Super Bowl ad. Armstrong praised the ad in a series of tweets, even going as far as to claim that “no ad agency would have done this ad.” That prompted a response from Cavallo of Martin, which won agency of record duties for Coinbase in May: “Except an ad agency did do that ad.”

 

Cavallo’s contention was that Martin had actually come up with the idea for the bouncing QR code, and in her tweet she cited pages in a deck the agency had submitted to Coinbase in August to prove it.

 

Accenture Interactive had been credited with creating the Super Bowl ad. Coinbase and Accenture Interactive did not respond to requests for comment.

 

Cavallo later said her intent was not to seek credit for Martin, but to call out Armstrong’s disrespect for the agency world in general. “It’s not an IP issue or credit issue,” said Cavallo, who later acknowledged in a LinkedIn post that “I understand that multiple agencies can arrive at a similar idea.”

 

Rather, Cavallo said in an interview, “I think that ad agencies are tired of feeling the lack of respect that shows up in so many ways. It shows up in timelines, it shows up in fees, it shows up in jump balls. It shows up in extraordinarily long pitches, it shows up in not having a seat at the table, it shows up in being actively dismissed or erased for our contribution. I feel like agencies are feeling dismissed and that the value of what we provide is being called into question every day.”

 

Cavallo’s sentiment resonated with the agency world, which roared approval. “I hope [Cavallo’s action] inspires the agency world to stand up for itself," said Mike Duda, partner, Bullish. “There is a lot of bad behavior and it won’t stop if you don’t call it out—and she did it with absolute class.”

 

Coinbase CMO Kate Rouch said in a tweet Monday that, "Multiple agencies—including The Martin Agency—pitched us ideas that included QR codes for several different campaigns. However none of the ideas from any of our partners were conceptually what we were looking for and remained on the cutting room floor."

 

Rouch said she made the decision for Coinbase to drop Martin after becoming CMO: “Breaking up is hard to do,” she tweeted. “I wish the team at The Martin Agency all the best.” As for Armstrong’s initial tweets crediting Coinbase’s in-house team for the ad, Rouch said: “The fit with our creative partner Accenture Interactive (AI) was seamless—so much to that extent our CEO actually thought we were a single team when presenting work.”

 

Glenn Cole, founder and creative chair at 72andSunny, says this is all part of an “overdue” conversation on the true value of creativity. “Agencies have an opportunity to better understand how value is truly measured and perceived by their clients,” Cole said. “Clients have an opportunity to re-evaluate how, and maybe even why, they need a creative partner and how to foster an environment and relationship that makes the most of it, otherwise, why bother? Clearly, expectations are not aligned in a lot of these relationships. You can’t build trust in that environment.”

 

The Big Game ad

 

Coinbase’s minimalist Super Bowl ad made a splash among flashy Big Game work with its bouncing, color-changing QR code. The spot racked up big numbers for the crypto platform and even crashed its site briefly, although it ultimately placed last in USA Today’s Super Bowl Ad Meter. Overall, the ad seemed an incontrovertible success. In the tweet thread, Armstrong said an unnamed agency pitched Coinbase “a bunch of standard Super Bowl ad ideas,” which he defined as “gimmicky, celebrity cameo driven, going for a laugh,” but that ultimately the brand’s internal team thought up their own ideas. In her tweets, Cavallo claimed Martin pitched the floating QR code concept on Aug. 18 and Oct. 7, 2021, and referenced the page numbers of the pitch that she says contained the idea.

 

Armstrong’s tweet credited his company’s team with “breaking the rules on marketing” and charged that agencies are too concerned with impressing their peers. In his tweets, Armstrong also said that the work was partially inspired by Reddit’s 5-second 2021 Super Bowl ad. That spot was produced by R/GA, which shared its own thoughts on the situation over Twitter.

 

R/GA had in fact participated in the review for Coinbase’s business last year but had not pitched any work that was similar to the Super Bowl spot this year, according to Tiffany Rolfe, R/GA’s global chief creative officer.

 

The industry weighs in

 

In a follow-up post on LinkedIn, Cavallo wrote that “I objected to the dismissive tone of [Armstrong’s] thread and the denigration of ad agencies. I felt compelled to respond to the bravado of, ‘No agency would have done this ad,’ because in fact, an agency did. The purpose of my response was to stand up for agencies and creatives, and the value we provide.”

 

At this writing, the post had more than 8,000 reactions and 515 comments. Prominent agency executives flooded social media with supportive comments, including Alex Lopez, global chief creative officer at McCann Worldgroup; Sandy Greenberg, co-founder and CEO of Terri & Sandy; Amani Duncan, president of BBH USA; Keith Cartwright, president and chief creative officer at Cartwright and Javier Campopiano, global chief creative officer of Grey.

 

“I was so happy to see somebody finally calling a client out for this kind of thing, it’s not just the bad behavior. It’s the arrogance that really gets to me, which was my first reaction when I saw it,” said Nancy Hill, co-founder and CEO of Media Sherpas and former CEO of the 4A’s. “It was a way that he was so dismissive of ad agencies and what it is that they can do for a brand or for a company.”

 

Standing up

 

The issues brought up from the tweet struck a nerve with other leaders in the industry, with a recurring theme that this is an all too common problem.

 

“If you stand up for your work in this way, you can be labeled as difficult to work with. And no agency wants to be that. So we stay silent. We don’t say anything,” said Kendra Schaaf, managing director at Mojo Supermarket. “We let people steal our ideas because we want clients to call us in the future. This is the primary reason you don’t hear stories like this. But we’re seeing more agencies believe in their work and their reputation.”

 

“And on the ‘No agency could have done this,’ I didn’t realize all the creative advertising geniuses were hiding at Coinbase. Looks like we’ve been recruiting from the wrong places,” Schaaf added.

 

David Demuth, CEO at Doner said, “I think more and more with clients building in-house operations and doing project-based engagements and things like that, it’s bound to happen. For agencies, our ideas and our intellectual property, that’s our currency. And when those things are being co-opted or stolen and we don't get paid for it, that’s unfortunate.”

 

Lindsey Slaby, founder of Sunday Dinner added that she was “befuddled” as to why Armstrong “felt it necessary to have this Twitter dialogue,” but applauded Cavallo’s willingness to speak up. “I like to see leaders who are always looking forward and that can mean blowing things up. It takes very brave and new leaders to do this. People from different industries, different backgrounds, and with different points of view.”

 

And she added: “Since when is Accenture not creative either? [Global Chief Creative Officer] Neil Heymann and [CEO and Creative Chairman] David Droga happen to be at the helm and are two of the most visionary creative talents of our lifetime.”

 

‘Promiscuous world’

 

Jeff Goodby, co-founder of Goodby Silverstein & Partners, said both clients and agencies have obligations, particularly now given the unraveling of agency of record relationships.

 

“In a promiscuous new world of project work, it’s up to the clients to keep these things straight. You are playing fast and loose with people’s creativity, craft and ultimately, livelihoods,” said Goodby, adding that clients need to consider: “Will your brand want that reputation? Brands are going to have to give a shit about things like this.”

 

This discussion is far from over and Cavallo, for one, believes it’s overdue. “I have received a few emails from industry leaders that I respect that have suggested that we get together and talk about how we can propel the industry forward and I look forward to that,” Cavallo said. “I hope that agencies and clients unpack why this struck a chord. I hope they unpack what is the deeper issue that motivated so many people in this instance and how can we create a level footing between agencies and clients based on mutual respect and value for the role of marketing in generating business success.”

 

Contributing: Keira Wingate

15744: Is D&AD Angling To Award Itself A White Pencil?

 

Adweek reported D&AD is still accepting award submissions from Russia—but diverting the entry fees collected to make donations to the Art Director’s Club of Ukraine. Gee, how philanthropic. The pseudo-noble gesture seems like a reprimand of sorts to Russian creative people, many of whom probably have no role at all in the country’s military moves against their Ukrainian neighbors.

 

The D&AD donation drivel drive does inspire questions.

 

Did D&AD ever consider diverting entry fees from White U.S. creatives to support Black Lives Matter? Or converting cash sent by White male U.S. creatives into contributions to back the “me too.” Movement?

 

Does D&AD—with its multi-hued pencils—really care about any color besides green?

 

(Oh, and there’s an explanation for the post title here.)

 

D&AD Continues to Accept Russian Entries for 2022 Awards—Donates Fees to Ukraine

 

The creative organization has said cash from Russia will go to the Art Director's Club of Ukraine instead

 

By Rebecca Stewart

 

Creative organization D&AD will continue to accept Russian entries to its 2022 awards scheme but says it will donate fees from the country to the Art Director’s Club of Ukraine, following the invasion of the country by its neighbor.

 

The organization has told Adweek that will not exclude Russian creatives from its annual awards scheme, which highlights world-class work across commercial design, advertising, production and craft. So far, it has received 64 entries from Russia and 14 from Ukraine. All money received by Ukrainian companies for entries into D&AD Awards 2022 will also be refunded.

 

Prices vary across categories to enter the D&AD Awards, starting at $32 to be considered for the purpose-based Impact Award and rising up to as much as $1,512 to enter into craft categories, such as animation and visual effects.

 

“As members of Art Directors Club Europe ourselves, we are donating the money we receive from Russian entries to the Ukraine chapter in order to do what we can, within the constraints of our charitable remit, to support the creative community of Ukraine during this time of crisis,” explains a statement from D&AD.

 

The announcement comes as global governments, businesses and sporting bodies sever ties with Russia amid its military attack on Ukraine.

 

The Art Directors Club of Ukraine is an outpost of the Art Directors Club Europe; a non-profit which represents more than 6500 European creatives across 21 countries.

 

“D&AD stands in solidarity with the people of Ukraine, believing in the sovereignty of the nation, the values of democracy and the right of its citizens to live in peace and safety,” the organization continued.

 

“As a charity serving the creative industries, our remit confines us to supporting the creative community. Therefore, in order to do what we can to support the creative industries in Ukraine, all money received by Ukrainian companies for entries into D&AD Awards 2022 will be refunded back to the entrants. These entries received to date, as well as any further work received from Ukrainian companies, will remain in the competition free of charge.”

 

‘Immediate action’

 

The group acknowledged that redistributing Russian entry fees to support the creative community in Ukraine was not a “comprehensive solution,” but instead an “immediate action” it could take to provide support to its colleagues and community in a country under siege.

 

On top of financial and trade sanctions from Western governments, the past week has seen Russia banned from participating in or hosting international events including the UEFA Champion’s League, the World Cup and the Eurovision song contest.

 

On February 28, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) Executive Board also issued a resolution urging all international sporting events to prohibit Russian and Belarusian athletes from competing.

 

Brands are also severing ties with the country, including Shell and BP, which said it would exit joint ventures in Russia earlier in the week.

 

Creatives in Ukraine have issued an open brief to the global community calling on marketers to help ‘Prevent WW3’ by encouraging charitable donations, persuading the NATO alliance to close Ukraine’s skies and ‘hack Russian propaganda’.

15743: BHM 2022—Fade To Black…