Shush! It’s the radio ads

Michael Hedges June 25, 2009 Follow on Twitter

Here in the south of France, the Cannes International Advertising Festival gathers ad people to celebrate advertising creativity, pat themselves on the back and, well, party like it’s 1999. Every medium has its moment, some longer than others. If you are very quiet you can still hear the radio ads.

Humor, of course, won most of the this years Cannes Radio Lions. The Grand Prix for best radio campaign went to Johannesburg agency Net#work BBDO and production house FIRST#LEFT. Their entry was a series for airline Virgin Atlantic titled “Plain Insanity.” The three spots are simply twisted story-telling. Check out the ferret.

The Gold Lion for radio went to US agency DeVito/Verdi for its long running campaign for the National Thoroughbred Racing Association. The spots feature a hyper-excited announcer describing disastrous life events with the same aplomb as a stereotypical race announcer.  One spot features an Oktoberfest trip gone very bad.

“I think we're going to continue to ride this horse because it keeps leading us to the winner's circle," said DeVito/Verdi president Ellis Verdi.

Grey Turkey called for order in the daily chaos with its Silver Lion winner for Google Turkey. Selling Google search tips. “Silence the horns…shush…”.

Also back this year for US agency, this time for a Silver Lion, is the Budweiser Bud Light “Real Men of Genius” series. And, too, “Mr. Golf Tournament Quiet Sign Holder Upper,” says something about “shush”. 

The 12 Bronze Lions went to a mix of retail ads and public service spots. India’s Rediffusion Y&R took bronze for “Vendana,” the American India foundation’s children’s literacy campaign.

Radio jury chairman Matthew Bull, chief creative officer of South Africa’s Lowe worldwide, said a radio spot works when you want to hear it over and over. At the press conference announcing the Radio Lions winners – giving the gaggle a chance to hear all the winning spots – the assembled multitudes seemed to want more from DeVito/Verdi race announcer. Perhaps the ad people related to the rapid-fire presentation.

Clearly, the Cannes Radio jury sensed a missing link, awarding less than half again as many Radio Lions as last year. The ad people love new media and radio isn’t blowing up their skirts like it used to. The big buzz – so far – has been for an edible direct mail campaign from Japan and a South African outdoor campaign that used recycled Zimbabwean money. 

"It's an old medium and a lot of it has been done before,” said Matthew Bull. “To remain fresh, it needs to link with a broader digital world.”

“This is a medium that has been around for a long time and only uses really once sense, which is audio,” said juror James Mok, Executive Creative Director of DraftFCB New Zealand to B&T (June 24), “so you are really limited in the number of ways you can use that, to a certain degree.”

Altogether, 86 countries submitted 22652 entries for Cannes. There were 1153 radio entries, 167 shortlisted and 33 winners. The Cannes Lions website http://work.canneslions.com/radio/ has all the winners for your listening pleasure.

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