The Drum Awards for Marketing - Extended Deadline

-d -h -min -sec

Christmas Weapon7

adVENT: Why are agency Christmas 'cards' so hard to do?

Author

By Jeremy Garner, creative director

December 24, 2013 | 4 min read

It's Christmas, in case you hadn't noticed, and while cheer, joy and goodwill to all men is being spread far and wide, everyone has a little grumble at this time of year as well. The Drum has invited some of those heading up some of the UK's finest media and marketing communications companies to share their pet hates that annoy them in their jobs at this time of year, albeit with tongue firmly in cheek.

Jeremy Garner, executive creative director, Weapon7

Picture the scene: everyone sat round in the boardroom throwing bits of mince pie at each other and croaking out random ideas.

People are looking through each other; there are pregnant pauses, copywriters are suppressing guffaws behind their half-guzzled mugs of mulled wine, which contain lots of little floating pieces of cheese-bread.

Then someone takes the initiative and attempts to write a brief, therefore trying to capture exactly what the agency stands for and what makes it different. There, this person proclaims, all hands-on-hips and matronly. Now we have something we can all work to, and everyone can feel as if they're singing from the same hymn sheet.

Shortly after, this person is immediately forced to dive for cover behind a desk as hundreds of mini hand grenades, in the form of chewed-up chunks of stuffing, are bombarded at them (metaphorically speaking). These mushy bomblets hit them in the eyes and splatter on their brain, as all manner of disagreements on 'positioning' and 'ethos' come raining forth.

Someone else steps in and suggests that maybe an audit can be done of 'the competitive landscape'. Great idea. Is there a Jacqueline present, they ask, for Jacquelines always seem to be good at this type of thing.

Luckily there is, so Jacqueline knocks back a gigantic sip of Starbucks (extra Christmas blend) and, suppressing a strong panic attack and mild caffeine-induced seizure, pulls up Google on her screen and begins to rat-a-tat-tat agency names into the text field.

She adjusts her specs so that they are nestled on the edge of her nose and weighs up the merits of each example. Hmmm, she mumbles. Webcams, hashtags, GPS positioning, Pinterest, simple apps, games and... things.

The team wait patiently, and are all quiet now. They watch intently as her specs drop further down the laterals of her nose and her mumbling becomes lower and lower in tone. She takes another sip of drink and the junior copywriter notices that some of the cappuccino has dripped out from the corner of her mouth and made a mess on the table, such is the intensity of Jacqueline's concentration.

Suddenly, Jacqueline begins to talk. She proclaims that some of the other agencies cards are 'quite cool', some aren't, and that it's technology that seems to stand some apart.

But what does this mean? asks one of the team. What does this mean for 'our brand'?

But Jacqueline doesn't answer. She simply doesn't have time to. Disaster has struck. She's on the floor screaming; rolling over and over and throwing the remnants of the coffee in all random directions.

The situation doesn't compute with her.

There is no magic formula, one of the team declares, and they all begin throwing little chunks of mince pie at each other again. It's back to square one.

Someone picks up Jacqueline, takes the coffee away from her, dusts her down, and the team do a high five, a whoop, and resume the brainstorm.

They're lovin' it.

I think.

Christmas Weapon7

More from Christmas

View all

Trending

Industry insights

View all
Add your own content +