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Opening Address at the Food Beverage Marketing Summit Montreux

I had a great time in Montreux at the Food & Beverage Marketing Summit. Some fascinating speakers. Here is my opening address for downloading if you are interested. It covers WB Yeats, Fernando Casasempere the sculptor from Chile, food labelling, connected communication, holy relics and sensory marketing...all in 10 minutes...!Download opening_address

M&M Europe Awards night

Great night had by most at the 2006 Media and Marketing Europe Awards night. Good to see non-UK based international agencies collecting awards. Congratulations to OMD as media agency of the year and Fallon as Creative Agency of the Year. Some might feel that Fallon won the award on the basis of one ad - the Sony Bravia Bouncing Balls ad. Not sure of that myself.

One thing is for sure. Making a simple ad is becoming as cool as Cliff Richard and Johnny Halliday. The Sony Bravia ad has managed to prove that there is life in the old dog yet. First we have the memorable visual elements, then the strong sonic branding which has taken a life of it's own (and shifted lots of units for Jose Gonzalez), add to that the contribution of word of mouth to it's status as a great ad and of course the little matter of it's contribution to helping Sony sell lots of tellies.

This ad has done more than just shift tellies and CDs though. It has highlighted the overall contribution that great creative work still makes to the success of the clients business. In a world of growing focus on procurement, numbers and ROI, we should celebrate such stunning work that proves epic ads can help shift units. We should fight any move towards mediocrity, which inevitably comes with shifts towards marketing by spreadsheet.

So if Fallon won the award for only this one piece of work, well frankly good on them.

And good on M&M Europe for ensuring that these awards are given out for campaigns judged equally on communications insights, media brilliance, creative excellence and business results. Looking forward to seeing even more great work next year.