Are you a Cannes chaser or brand builder?

An Opinion piece from the Manila Times on the theory that there are two schools of thought in creative departments at advertising agencies - the Cannes Chasers and the Brand Builders.

Cannes is the genre of out-of-the-box creatives, whose adherents, mostly the new young generation of ad writers, whose big ambition is to win awards in the most famous hall of them all, the Cannes Festival, the Oscar of advertising.

Brand builders are more traditional. They are driven by sales and market performance, at least 25 years of experience in advertising doing brand building. They work in partnership with manufacturing companies applying the multidisciplinary requirements of marketing and communications strategy. Winning awards is immaterial to them. Awareness of brand message and market gains are.

Both schools worship the goddess of creativity. But their attitudes and outlook differ in creating advertising.