Or: how to avoid your one-way ticket to irrelevance

We live in extraordinary times, where new, digitally-activated startup brands continually topple the hegemony of big-business with unruffled ease. The product landscape in many consumer categories already looks unrecognisable compared to just a few years ago - and when Fever-Tree tonic replaces Schweppes even on board British Airways flights, you know that no holy cow is safe anymore. How fabulously exciting that is.

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It’s hard to feel an iota of sympathy for the legions of Suits complaining about how hard it is for ‘creative agencies’ these days.

But consider for a moment the thinkers and craftspeople stuck in that quicksand - confronted daily by risk averse ‘managers’, sour lemonade budgets, cocaine expectations, and slag heaps of data.

Perhaps then it’s no surprise that some of the most interesting challenger brands have been/are being conceived by agency creatives sick to the back teeth of big clients who don’t listen.

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Why Big Business can't crack the challenger model

“Surely it can’t be that hard”, the thin-rim-bespectacled CEO thundered. “Go launch some copycats, and unleash our spending might. We’ll crush them in no time.” For the CEO in question, insert at will any of the distinguished gentlemen running whatever FMCG giant tickles your fancy. The scene might be imagined, but the reality of it is anything but: in boardrooms around the globe, Big Consumer Business is trying to respond to the challenger brand onslaught – and notably failing.

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Why chewing the fat is the Ad Man’s Kryptonite

It all used to be so beautifully easy. The Venerable P&G Rule Book for Effective Advertising codified the perfect 30-second ad in 5 easy steps: (1) set up a relatable context – cue woman-next-door in wholesome nest, (2) define the problem statement – children’s lifetime of happiness in ruins over vexing mud stains on pristine cricket gear, (3) offer relief – behold! it washes whiter!, (4) back up with evidence – confusing but strangely credible-looking animation of miraculous washing molecules, and (5) end with a close-up of the pack to a happy jingle – the ad-man’s money shot.

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When it’s gone, it’s gone. Rejoice!

There was genuine sadness in their eyes, and more than a hint of hurt pride. For the assembled coterie of McDonald’s executives, the maligning of their brand was simply incomprehensible. “All our beef comes from sustainable, local farms”, one of them said. “There’s only prime chicken breast in our Nuggets”, another insisted. “We give some of the most disadvantaged in our society safe jobs with decent pay and real prospects for productive lives. So why does everybody think we’re slave drivers and that there’s only disgusting gristle in our burgers?”.

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(Not) announcing the launch of The Craftory

The Craftory Ltd today pointedly failed to announce its launch via conventional PR Newswire. That’s because press releases are both endearingly ineffective corporate relics of the 20th Century, and because The Craftory’s target audience – those fearless CEOs and founders of the world’s boldest challenger brands – wouldn’t know what a PR Newswire was if it bit them in the derrière.

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