I can’t believe I’m saying this, but I’m starting to not dislike Campaign quite so much
Campaign magazine has been the UK ad industry’s rag of choice for as long as anyone can remember (years ago someone – I think it was John Hegarty – ran an ad for it with the line ‘when was the last time someone stole your copy of Marketing Week?’).
In the twenty-or-so years I’ve been a reader, it’s changed a great deal, generally with the ebb and flow of the industry itself. When things were a bit more fun and glamorous in the 90s Campaign was equally so, reflecting the position we thought the industry was in as a purveyor of million-pound Levi’s ads that the public swooned over.
But even in those days it was generally considered to be little more than the perfect way to occupy the time it took to do a Thursday morning dump. Yes, everyone read it and by default gave a shit (pun intended) about what was in it, but to a great extent that was because there was no decent competition.
But in the last decade or so it’s been particularly poor. Last August I wrote a post about its insane run of front page headlines that mentioned pitches and speculated thus:
1. Nothing interesting is happening in advertising beyond these pitches. Possible, but surely someone has started up an agency in this time. When did 101 start? What’s Beta doing now? What about when Farah Ramzen left AMV? Wasn’t that a big enough story for the front page?
2. Campaign doesn’t consider anything but account moves to be significant enough for the front page. Maybe. I mean, it is a really awful, lazy, dull, unambitious, craven excuse for a magazine. It’s just possible that they can’t be bothered to do anything other than regurgitate press releases.
One of the two.
A commenter pointed out that it was indeed mainly made up of press releases from firms who used this PR company, which coincidentally was run by the husband Campaign’s then editrix.
So far so shite, but sometime recently, perhaps this year, it seems to have been taken over by people who, while they may not exactly be Woodward and Bernstein, do seem to have added a bit more meat to a few of their articles and opinions.
I confess I don’t read it every week, but it just seems to have a touch more substance these days (aside from the ridiculousness of doing a radio Private View).
Perhaps it will continue to improve. I’ll keep an eye on every third copy and see what happens.
A view from the top/bottom is good, although the people who contribute are more often than not from the beige middle or are well past their sell by date and use it to catch a glimpse, before they finally disappear, albeit up their own arse hole. Entertaining nevertheless, passes the time. Seems to cause a stir sometimes too…
Yeah, definitely heading in the right direction again.
But the new guy’s editorial on Droga 5 buy-out was shocking. Huge story there but the piece had all the impetus of a wet handshake.
In fact, Ben, Droga 5 news worth a post surely?
In what way?
Erm, now you’ve gone and put me on the spot.
Lots of talk from gripers in the industry that big holding companies/networks can sometimes kill the creative spark.
So I suppose the fact that Droga 5 – one of the hotter agencies around – has decided to spurn the likes of WPP but opt for a tie-up with the holy grail of ‘talent’ via WME, might be of interest.
Would be interested to hear your thoughts, that’s all.
Campaign is like Marmite. You either love it or hate it or you don’t give a shit either way.
The agency world has never been so interesting, diverse, foolish and cut-throat. You’d never really know that if you’d read Campaign over the last 5 years. When you have no rivals it’s easy to be lazy and take the many bribes and ‘incentives’ available. I agree that the new bloke has started to make changes for the better. Last week, I read it during my 11.08 – 11.13 am shit and still hadn’t managed to read all of Private View. Yep, it seems to be doing something right at last.
As an aside, do you remember that column “Where are they now?” featuring past luminaries such as Geoff Seymour. Sobering stuff. They only did it twice. But it was journalism and relevant.
Yes, that column was great.
It’s always been the lack of journalism I’ve objected to. There are so many issues worth following up and really getting into but instead they just curled their magazines out, like so many vanilla turds.
Lazy, lazy, fucking lazy.
Think you’re wrong about Campaign.
Last week’s VFTT made me sick in my mouth. ‘Dinner with my lawyer chums from Oxford’. Well done – you managed not to tell us about your Oxbridge education until the last possible moment. How about ‘dinner with my lawyer chums from college’ you cock?! View Up My Own Arse would be a better description.
And a gang of Shoreditch beardies wanking each other off about mobiles. Again.
Sorry.
I think the rag is a sea anchor that holds the industry back.