Jesse Jackson, Syl Saller, and a Snapchat Ferris wheel

This year’s Cannes Global Festival of Creativity was certainly not without its share of controversy. From almost the moment one arrived to savour the famous Croisette, the sense of a very different Cannes experience was palpable. 

For a start, one was hard pressed to find a creative agency logo amongst the tsunami of Accenture’s, IBM’s, Oracle’s and Deloitte’s flags crowding out the beach-side cabanas. Further down the beach the usual Facebook, You Tube, Google and The Economist staked out their patches.

And if you took a wander down to the more subdued harbour area, most of the boats had been hired by obscure video/tech companies. 

But it was the giant Snapchat Ferris wheel right outside the Palais, that got Publicis Groupe new global chief Arthur Sadoun in such a spin that he saw it as an affront to creativity and a sad reflection on the agency holding companies who had ‘lost their thought leadership in Cannes’. Hardly a surprise then when he announced that his entire Groupe was pulling out of entering any awards next year to spend the money on an internal engagement AI platform!   

But step inside the actual Palais and things were not so different.

Alongside the constant thread of ‘creativity and its ability to change the world’ the strongest themes this year were gender equality, the removal of stereotypes in advertising, diversity and storytelling. I was privileged to hear Dame Helen Mirren talking about her own insecurities as a woman and actress despite her success whilst featuring some powerful L’Oreal work that redefined diversity. Also, Sir Ian McKellen was his usual animated self, explaining how his film career had exploded after he came out and became a more authentic, relaxed person.

But it was perhaps the civil rights campaigner Jesse Jackson that had the most surprising take on ‘branding’. 

He pointed out that he thought Coca Cola was ‘underbranded’ because it failed to talk about the huge numbers of people it employs across the African continent. In his opinion this was one of the best things they had done and was far more impressive than some false ‘purpose’ created within the marketing team. 

Indeed, senior marketers were well aware that there was an incipient ‘purpose backlash’ in the air, but as Diageo’s Global CMO Syl Saller remarked in a ‘Wake up with the Economist’ session, marketers need to ‘give themselves a break’ and not be cowed by the social media outrage every time they try to do something worthwhile or purpose driven.  (She was even including Pepsi’s infamous Kendall Jenner ad, claiming most consumers were not offended by it!)

This review of Cannes Lions 2017 was by Chris Pearce, CEO of TMW Unlimited. Follow him @chrispearce.