Leo Burnett Beirut’s 2012/2q GPC: Transparency?!
Leo Burnett Beirut’s 2012/2q GPC: Transparency?!
By Admin I : So we’re reaching a new pattern of reviews here, dealing with a huge multinational agency such as Leo Burnett is by no means underestimated, at least by brofessionals like us, since we’re pretty sure they can barely read our usual reviews without rolling eyes and using their pretentious attitudes saying “Who the hell are those bloggers?!”
Whether you can digest criticism or not – or not – and I surely don’t mean employees only, we’re here talking about senior executives and clients; we came across your GPC report, and lucky us, the report is available for the public!
So why wasting a chance to review how an agency asses itself, how a change in behavior is perceived by the so-called ‘creatives’ after a roller-coaster year, talking about advertising in general, and Leo Burnett Beirut in particular (Exotica alone is enough proof!)
The report is an ego nirvana celebration with lots of cheese even though the whole industry is shifting towards more rational realistic policies, going far from the orthodox methods of aging multinationals:
“It’s clear from our performance at Cannes that we’re firing on all cylinders, and our HumanKind philosophy is helping to push the needle forward for the entire industry”
Really?!
So back to the GPC results, and if you aren’t familiar with it, the GPC was founded by Donald Gunn and Michael Conrad as a quality control mechanism for Leo Burnett Worldwide and the scale is distributed as following:
1 – Appalling 2 – Destructive 3 – Not Competitive 4 – Cliche 5 – Innovative Strategy 6 – Fresh Idea 7 – Excellence in Craft 8 – New standard in the category 9 – New standard in advertising 10 – Best in the world, bar none
Leo Burnett Beirut had an 8+ ranking this quarter, which is highly debatable (chill! we’re not pretending to know more than the board of executives, but we’re just stating our minds). The ranking is based on the ability to change behavior through creative work and it’s what mainly determines promotions and bonuses within the agency (wish everyone can do a bad performance and still grab a bonus!)
Johnnie Walker grabbed 3 high rankings in the GPC, kind of expected for an inspirational campaign but somehow overrated especially that it became redundant and never “changed behavior” unless making people drunk is considered a notable behavior change.
Diageo – Johnnie Walker
Keep Walking Lebanon – Nadine Labaki
Leo Burnett / Beirut
GPC score 8.0
Category: Integrated
Diageo – Johnnie Walker
Keep Walking Lebanon / Nadine Labaki – On Set
Leo Burnett / Beirut
GPC score 7.3
Category: Film
Diageo – Johnnie Walker
Keep Walking Lebanon / Nadine Labaki – On Screen
Leo Burnett / Beirut
GPC score 7.6
Category: Film
The second campaign assessed was café super Brazil, and a 7.7 is a well deserved ranking here: the campaign portrayed a genuine Lebanese ritual and revived a brand that was struggling in the market!
Café Super Brasil Read the Country’s Fortune
Leo Burnett / Beirut
GPC score 7.7 / 7.8
Category: Integrated / Film
Himaya is probably one of the most overrated campaigns of the year! A Cannes Lions, and a 7.7 GPC ranking for a campaign that was reported inspired* (check this link)
Himaya Break the Silence
Leo Burnett / Beirut
GPC score 7.7 (Cannes Bronze PR Lion)
Category: Integrated
Himaya Repetition
Leo Burnett / Beirut
GPC score 7.7
Category: Film
Himaya Predator In The Park
Leo Burnett / Beirut
GPC score 7.2
Category: Ambient Media
Another campaign grabbing a well deserved 7.0 ranking for a good concept but somehow a weak execution.
Procter & Gamble – Max Factor
Evil Eye
Leo Burnett / Beirut
GPC score 7.0
Category: Print
What mainly raised Leo Burnett Beirut’s GPC to 8 is a 9.0 ranking for Farid Chehab’s book “A bet for a national conscience” weirdly perceived as a campaign, and weirdly assessed as behavior changing; it’s almost like who dares to give Leo Burnett MENA’s chairman a low ranking, people need their jobs in the end.
Leo Burnett Beirut A Bet For A National Conscience
Leo Burnett / Beirut
GPC score 9.0
Category: Integrated
No matter how transparent ad-men pretend to be, advertising seems like a field struggling to move forward but always faced by traditional media and thinking processes. Back then, they thought advertising could change the world (well, some are still convinced) yet now, it’s clear that “World-changing” ideas can barely reach an award show and end by a raise or a bonus.
Wishing Leo Beirut a good luck for the next few months of 2012, which seem more promising after the well done Alfa ad and Audi Bank animations, but remains a not very good year on so many levels.
“[Johnnie Walker] never “changed behavior” unless making people drunk is considered a notable behavior change.”
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LOL! You guys are awesome!
OK, so I’ll prepare some oranges (for whatever reason, this is the food you bring as a gift to prisoners) for when I visit you in #Brison. Your twitter admin will know what I’m talking about: #Ballvertising
Hahaha you’re hilarious Rouba!!! and I do manage twitter as well! I definitely know what you’re talking about but try not give them ideas here!
Dearest Admin, Bloggers….your criticism is in no way a Critique…more like a rookie wanting to make noise…white noise.
but i’d say one thing, a true critique will put some true substance (facts, statistical trends) to support their critique.
If you’re aim is to be noticed, then truly you have achieved your purpose. keep it up, it seems this who you are and this is ‘JAWKOUN”.
As a consumer, it’s how i connect with the brand…..and i must say , the work i saw on the above listed campaigns did connect with me. I guess to have covered all angles, it would have been prudent of you to have obtained & provided some stats on consumer response to these campaigns, How do you measure if it was successful, well back to the simple basics “numbers”…what was the volume increase of Cafe Super Brasil in the period following the start of the campaign? if it was flat or perhaps a 2-3 % volume increase then i would say it was somewhat ineffective. if it was >7 % then it is fair to say it was successful and the end objective was achieved. so on so forth for the rest of the campaigns you have mentioned above.I do not have such facts (in case you ask me later) hence why i was prudent not to state something i was’nt sure of (which should have been your approach). and further a constructive, or at the very least a true critique would offer and alternate…..nowhere in your blog did i see you offer an alternate (on the basis that any of these campaigns were not effective and did not truly reach the Consumer “the Customer”…”the King and the only One True Critique”)
Hope this Critique does not get deleted, at the very minimum to reflect the maturity of it’s operators as well as to reflect One’s openness to also be critiqued
Thanks for your comment Mija,
We strongly agree with you about the importance of a factual ground for any assessment, however, we have never claimed being objective or presenting credible stats to measure any campaign’s impact.
We are honestly subjective bloggers expressing our own opinion, many people agree with us and many don’t which makes an interaction happen and can start a debate that we highly cherish.
We are a platform that expresses opinions and raises questions, wishing to have another platform releasing numbers and facts, a job that we don’t do simply because we don’t claim being professionals, we are amateurs (brofessionals) and are by no means journalists.
We never ever delete comments,
would love reading more opinions and discussing design/advertising matters.
It is that simple,
Thank you!
Hello again & thanks for your response ,
I guess it’s fair to say in this case that you , throughout this page,are simply making a statement not founded on any facts but more based on a state of one’s mood “a state of feeling either superior or inferior, accomplished, aspiring or lack of, your so called state of Nirvana
cause the alternate reality might be a bit tough for you to Digest. In any case it would be prudent to drop the use of the word “criticism” which you vaguely used in your blog and replace it with the word “Bullsh*t” . Cause BS changes nothing and again you have achieved a closed loop of “white noise”.
Referring to yourselves as “Amateurs” is the one thing we are in agreement on. (thanks for posting)
We just don’t label what we do, feel free to call it whatever you want, we wouldn’t get offended.
What we say is not based on our mood swings but on a solid design education, experience and daily interaction with research and design matters.
We’re very proud being active amateurs, faced by passive professionals most of the time.
We can publish anything you want to say, we are a platform after all.