Page 30 - AdNews Sep-Oct 2021

Investigation
through smart growth strategies and creative thinking. These ... are hungry for progress.”
Tony Bradbourne, founder and CEO/CCO of Special Group: “I think the New Zealand tone, at its very world-beating best, is ambitious with a healthy slice of humour.
“If I think back on the Cannes Grand Prix winning work from New Zealand during the past dec- ade, they all had the perfect mix of those two elements.”
Special’s Iggy Pop + Orcon, where nine Kiwis in their garages were connected to Iggy Pop in Miami to re-record Iggy’s iconic track, The Passenger, was highly ambitious but it was the humour that made it popular and successful.
Bradbourne says Colenso’s Brewtroleum was an ambitious idea to create a brand new fuel out of spent beer waste, but brilliantly wrapped in humour: “Drink beer, save the entire planet”.
Y&R’s McWhopper, challenging McDonald’s to “End the beef, with beef” used humour mixed with scale to create global headlines.
Below: Essence health. Opposite: Saatchi
& Saatchi’s Chorus “badnet” campaign.
“From our perspective at Special, while COVID-19 has been uniquely difficult and unsettling, it has also allowed us to move to a new gear by connecting with more and more global clients,” says Bradbourne.
“During lockdowns and with long periods of working from home, I think a lot of smart marketers, globally, realised, ‘It’s not where our
agencies are based, it’s actually about how good their thinking is.’
“As a result, we are working with a lot more global clients and across
a much wider global footprint.”
Fleur Head, managing director, VMLY&R NZ: “One positive aspect
that came out of 2020 was more kindness, understanding and appre- ciation for each other in the industry.
“Agencies stopped being so competitive and replaced this competi- tiveness with a genuine desire to help and support each other.
“Clients spent a lot more time showing their appreciation for agency partners and the teams working on their projects. Even though we weren’t spending time together face to face, agencies and clients became closer than ever.”
More a sense of partnership with clients and the genuine willingness by both agency and clients to co-create and work collaboratively, says Fleur. Less of an “us and them” or “client and supplier” dynamic.
“I believe this is really positive for the industry as a whole,” she says.
“As a nation, NZ has come through this time more united than ever. There is a strong appetite for being truly inclusive and achieving equitable outcomes for all.
“New Zealanders seem to be more focused on the collective good instead of the individual gain. I think this will translate to some world-leading process changes, including approaches to communica- tions and the way agencies operate.”
Nick Vile, general manager, oOh!media New Zealand: “We are a small nation with big dreams and love to get recognition on the global stage. As cheesy as that sounds, it really is true.