Dear Advertising

Dear Advertising,

How you Chommie?

It’s been a while since we hung out. You, me and a wild idea. Thriving. Just like the old days.

Anyway. Somebody was talking about you the other day. Kind of behind your back, but in a kind way. They said “Shame, it feels like advertising has a slow puncture.” And I was like, wow. I can see how people could be feeling that right now.

It was always about the work with you. The work. The work. The work. We’d come in, we’d make something, and if it was good we went home happy. If it was great we went to the Loeries. Cannes even.

The work was the joy and the joy was in the work and none of us had to think about it too hard.

Then it got harder. Much harder. They put more people in your approval process. And research. Research on the idea. Research on the execution. Research on the research. They judged you before you were ready. And now there’s a machnie that will happily do the first draft of the thing we used to get praised for. In less time. Been done used to be an insult. Now it must be done because it’s best practice. And because Instagram, everybody can be a photographer. Canva, a designer. TikTok, a director. The things that used to set us apart. Right now somebody’s kid is giving edit feedback to make it fire, via voice note to their parent, who is the CEO of a something. Hopefully their airtime runs out. If not, another opinion.

Less great work made. Less joy to be found in what we do. Not even Cannes is about the work anymore. It’s a battle for another beach in France.

Making the work is still where the most joy is. But if we’re not doing as much of that, it’s easy to think the whole thing is a bit pap.

But that’s not what I think. I don’t think you have a slow puncture. I think you’re awesome and the real joy is just being around you.

You give us days that don’t repeat. Some of us have been doing this a long time and still can’t tell you what next Tuesday looks like. For us, Groundhog Day will only ever exist as a great film.

You let us wear sneakers to work. Small thing. Try that in accounting. The collective noun for accountants is a “no”.

You introduce us to cool people. And famous people. And interesting people, which is even better. And it happens often.

You get us into rooms. Recording studios. Edit suites. Factory floors. Someone’s kitchen at 2am for a shoot that didn’t need to be at 2am. Sometimes the big, big boss’s office too. Whole worlds we’ve got no business being in, opened because there was a job number.

You get us tickets to things. Let’s not pretend that isn’t a perk. Except the Loeries Rockstar Pass. Those are super hard to get unless you’re from Dubai.

The friends you’ve introduced us to? That’s a book not a letter.

You let us solve actual problems. Sometimes it’s a price, or a name, or a reason for the thing to exist at all. Anything can be an ad if you do it right. Somebody’s business works better afterwards. People stay employed. You’re closer to economies than we’ll ever know. And you’re so humble about it. Except on LinkedIn. But that’s not really you talking, is it?

You let us teach. Somebody arrives at 20 knowing nothing and four years later they’re better than everybody. Watching people rise beats anything on the shelf in reception. And even though we all have different reasons for being here, you find room for all of us somewhere.

And yes, from time to time, you still let us make something that changes something. Not often. But it happens. And when it does you feel different when you arrive at your parents for dinner. Not that most of our parents know exactly what we do anyway.

I’m not romanticising you.

Some of this is properly hard right now and pretending otherwise helps nobody. We’re tired. Our teams are smaller. And we need to do it faster with less of everything. The pressure is real and it isn’t going away because I decided to write my old friend a letter. BTW, it came to me in a fever dream after implementing that kid’s edit feedback. He didn’t run out of airtime

But I do think it’s important to say you’re alive and well. And we appreciate you. Just not in the same way the ad ancestors told us we would. When the big joy was everywhere, nobody bothered counting the small ones. They were there the whole time. We just didn’t need to look for them.

Somebody definitely needs to show the new people where to look too. Might as well be us.

Personally, I notice them most days now. Same job. Same building. Mostly the same people, because the lifers can’t be kept down. You know who you are.

We’re not going anywhere.

Except maybe to jump on a quick call, where we’re going to lie about the scores we’ve given each other on a relationship survey. Everybody knows it too. And while that’s happening, one of us is buying sneakers online. Me. It’s me. And because of you, I get to wear them to work.

I really do love this job.

Jokes pal. You’re way more important than sneakers. Without you we would be able to do any of this.

So this is me kicking the tyre. You’re fine.

Chat soon,

Jake