Advertising Matters 08.11.19

BRIGHTON ROCKS 

For the last three days we have been down in Brighton at our annual Media Business Course (MBC), where over one hundred young industry practitioners and leaders of tomorrow get the opportunity to hear insights from industry leaders and experts on media planning and to pitch and compete with their own ideas on the subject.

The delegates were split into syndicates and received their blue-chip client brief to devise a full media strategy on the first day of the course. Since then they have been working on their pitches and have spent today presenting their ideas to a panel of judges (and against each other!). The winners will be announced tomorrow, so watch this space!

Delegates have also had the opportunity to hear from a stellar line up of speakers during the course, including the likes of Tracy de Groose of Newsworks, Rory Sutherland of Ogilvy, Simon Daglish of ITV and WPP’s Karen Blackett OBE.

You can find the MBC brochure, which includes the full agenda, here, and a gallery of photographs from day one here, and day two here.

YULE NEVER WARC ALONE

Last weekend we released new AA/WARC adspend figures forecasting businesses in the UK will spend £6.8 billion pounds on Christmas advertising during the final quarter of this year – the Golden Quarter for UK retailers. This is up 4.7% on the previous record amount in 2019 (£6.45).

Our Chief Executive, Stephen Woodford, commented: “Christmas is the biggest time of the year for brands and retailers and they recognise the power of advertising to tell a story that will capture the public’s imagination and tempt them into store or online. This year looks set to be a ground-breaking year for adspend and, at £6.8bn, the figure would be an increase on last-year’s, which was itself a record. We’re hopefully looking forward to a season of goodwill for British advertising and the national economy as brands and retailers invest in festive adverts like never before.”

You can read more on the figures in a piece by Mediatel Newsline here.

GIVING EVIDENCE AT THE HOUSE OF LORDS

Our President Keith Weed gave evidence on Tuesday to the Lords’ Democracy and Digital Technologies Committee alongside Paul Bainsfair, Kantar’s Eric Salama, and the ASA’s Lord Currie and Guy Parker. The Committee is taking evidence on the impact of digital technologies on democracy. Keith said that political advertising should be held to the same “legal, decent, honest and truthful” standards as commercial ads.

You can watch the meeting in Parliament here.

AD OF THE WEEK