I went to New York once to collect an award for my agency in London and my art director and I left it in a pub on the way home. I know. Rather remiss, but we did have a good celebration. Seems such a shame when agencies these days go to such lengths – and man hours pushing poor creatives to the brink, as they race to get their corporate hands on Gold and Silver and Bronze to decorate their reception areas.
In those days, it wasn’t so much of a stampede, trampling on the creative departments with demands on personal time, evenings and weekends. Clients were more willing to take risks five days a week, so creatives were allowed to be just that – creative. Acknowledgement from the industry for a job well done was simply the icing on the cake.
I’ll never forget our Financial Director coming into our office afterwards saying, “So you got third place, a bronze…in an award I’ve never heard of (it was ‘The One Show’)… and for a client we no longer retain…and you left it in a pub?” We shrugged. And that was that. But the fact is, when you’re allowed to be creative five days a week and you sleep normal hours and have a life, you bring more to the party everyday and you create better work. In fact, we won loads of awards, and the ones we didn’t leave in pubs we decorated our loos with, not our receptions – or our egos.
FREELANCE COPYWRITER DUBAI