“Independent agencies are the lifeblood of our business, pursuing new ideas and new ways of working, with the flexibility and agility that our rapidly changing industry needs today.”

Julian Boulding
President, thenetworkone

Bob Jane has. Dan Murphy has. The colonel has. Ted did along with his cameras. But Dick Smith didn’t. Harvey Norman didn’t and thank god Ken Bruce didn’t do it from the neck down.

Put my face in the logo please

But do we care what the founder or brand talisman looks like? It actually puts me off.

Distinctive faces can become a brand. Groucho and Hitchcock are testament to this. But ordinary joes mugging in a logo is just wrong, no matter how many tyres or bottles of Cab Sav they sell.

With Matt Duffey leading the troops and with clear instruction to start strongly, BD Brasil flew out the traps, closing down the opposition like men possessed.

After some unsure defending from Iris thanks to some constant closing we began to carve out some openings. It was only a matter of time before we made the breakthrough and it was Tim Dalton who passed one into the net to make it 1-0.. Having taken the opener, the chances continued to pile up though Iris were finding joy on the flanks and on the counter-attack, but were snuffed out by a stubborn BD defence. Dalton again struck with a great effort that curled into the top corner and left the keeper with no chance. Buoyed by a 2 goal lead, BD continued to press – Josh Norris was taken out in the box but the ref played a great advantage and the ball fell to Dalton who completed his hat-trick inside 30 mins.

With the half-time score at 3-0, it would’ve been easy for Iris to have thrown in the towel, but to their credit, back from the dead they came and pegged one back. At this point the tide had turned and Iris began to stamp their authority on the game, however, we kept our composure and kept battling away. A brilliant team move laid the ball on a plate for Matt M’Boge to put the seal on the game with a neat finish.

Three goal margin restored but back Iris came yet again, knowing that their pride was at stake and after we failed to clear the ball they punished us with a decent finish. Too little too late though and with the final result at 4-2 the celebrations broke out, having beaten Iris yet again to add even more misery on a team that clearly weren’t expecting to be beaten so comfortably. In truth, with all the work we’ve put in and determination we had in us, they didn’t stand a chance.

Final Score:-
BD Brasil 4 Iris 2

The line-up:-

Dermot Dever, Samuel Odoro-Ayim, Dan Gerrard, Dan Shone, Matt Duffey (c), Sam Steele, James Perry, Sean Cullen, Martyn Richardson, Tim Dalton, Matt M’Boge. Subs:- Telmo Alves, Aldo Brenna, Colin Knowx, Sam Prior, Josh Norris.

Today, BD’s Beanz Meanz campaign kicked off with the launch of the web site – inviting Australia to submit what Beanz Meanz to them to win a share of $100,000.

http://www.beanzmeanz.com.au/

More to follow…

Since winning three prestigious awards for our Australian WHISKAS Pledge campaign, BD Network has now been selected as a finalist for two more internationally recognised awards: The New York Festival International Advertising Awards where BD Network is the only finalist entry for Australia and the Festival of Media Awards taking place in Switzerland. All fingers and paws crossed!

The core objective of the WHISKAS Pledge campaign was to reinstate WHISKAS as the choice of Australia’s cats. We established that cats have always been the poor relation to dogs, and that their owners did not share the same social traits as dog owners did (i.e. walking). They were largely anonymous, but hugely active online.

Our campaign idea was simple. Allow owners to ‘Pledge’ their love for WHISKAS on their cat’s behalf. Cat owners were incentivised to join the WHISKAS Pledge website with 2 free ‘Oh So’ pouches and the opportunity for cat fame. If cat owners shared ‘how you know your cat loves WHISKAS’ they had the chance to win $10,000 and get their cat featured on pack.

We created and delivered all aspects of the campaign: TV, radio, press, outdoor, experiential, CRM, website IA/ redesign, online advertising, social media and retail activation.

This isn’t the only example of our award winning work this year. Our ‘Gimme Credit – Every Pack Gets 50p’ campaign won the Global Mobile Marketing ‘Best Use of Mobile Marketing in a promotion Europe, Middle East and Africa’ accolade as well as three ISP awards.

BD Network is appointed by Heinz

Heinz, has appointed BD Network as the below the line agency for its beans, sauces and soup brands.
BD Network will work closely with Abbott Mead Vickers BBDO and Vizeum to develop integrated marketing campaigns.

But not strictly true.

Otherwise agencies would substitute creative departments for cubicles. Brainstorms would be held in huge communal showers. War rooms – wet rooms and board rooms huge Roman spas. Planners would be allowed in the showers but only at briefing stage and account handlers would launder the towels and replenish the toiletries. Emerging agencies would hot-shower. Green agencies would use solar to heat their showers. Think Tank’s would record the showers to see what the optimum temperature and force of flow would be to achieve the best ideas. Sharing the brief would involve sharing the Imperial Leather. Digital agencies would spend hours trying to simulate the shower experience using augmented reality. The Networks would fragment their agencies into different offerings under sub – brands like ‘Deep Cleanse’, ‘Scrub’ and ‘Invigorate’. New Advertising agencies would try and reinvent the whole showering process and integrated agencies would connect the pipes from all the showers and believe that using the same water in every department will give their ideas a magical joined up feeling…

In our hunt for a new agency building, one of the nice to haves on the list is a shower.

The old saying goes ‘if you want to get ahead and get noticed, then get a hat’.

Sounds absurd, but the hat is one of the greatest marketing inventions of all time. The hat has always been a statement of personality, status and individuality. Is it mere coincidence that the tallest of hats are worn by very different people than the smallest of hats? My favourite, the flat cap is surely the most unassuming and apologetic hat of all.

Hats give us that ‘added extra’.

That’s why actors love them. Would Day-Lewis look as menacing without the stovepipe? Pacino as spaced-out without the Beanie in Serpico or indeed Clouseau as foolish without the trilby. In fact the hat can only be topped for opulence by one other garment, the cape. More on the cape coming soon.

In fact some hats go beyond branding. The semiotics behind the pirate hat, the witch or the crown could probably be understood in most countries around the world. Sometime hats are terrifying. Hugo Boss designed one of the most stylish uniforms/hats of all time for the SS. James Brown the editor of GQ (not the Godfather of Soul) lost his job over it, by putting Rommel into the top 200 stylish people of all time. Not the most intelligent of actions but the hat without the horrific connotations is pretty stylish, especially the lofty heights of the erect peak.

Hats are cult too, Doyles Deerstalker, the Easy Rider crash helmet, Alex’s Bowler from A Clockwork Orange, Cat in the Hat, all of YMCA, Odd Job and Ned Kelly…

America loves hats. They created a nation of the faceless with the baseball cap. First introduced in 1860 by the Brooklyn Excelsiors, it now remains a convenient place to hide behind or simply a substitute for hair. In fact the baseball hat that became the truckers hat (mini billboard on foam) is the slut of all hats and can be pimped by any brand, logo or emblem. The NYC baseballs hat has to be one the most recognized brands in the world today. Up there with the usual suspects, fast food brands, Coca-Cola, Ferrari and the Swoosh.

The hipsters and dandies are keeping the creativity of the hat alive today. The straw Panama, the Trilby, the Pork Pie placed on the back of the head, Flat Caps, and the Bowler are still seen sported with needle partings, oversized glasses and mo combos. A hat in this instance is pure flamboyance. Just as the Topper in its day and surely the Porsche/codpiece of all hats, the Stetson.

I love hats, but it’s no secret that some people are ‘hat people’. Usually, beautiful people. Gangsters looked great in hats. It made them bigger and more peacock-like. Like the forces, hats implied status and showed progression. A commis chef hats mirrors that of the army cadet. A General the pomp of the Head Chef. Have you noticed that the only people who wear beanies are good looking? Depp, Brand, Cobain… Surely the best thing finally about hats is that they are occasional by nature. We can blame wearing them on the sun, the rain, the snow, fashion, festivals, Halloween, parties, weddings, the races, Xmas or the odd mid life crisis… And when we don’t quite pull them off we can do precisely that. Back into the dressing up box until we find a new reason, new season, new set of friends or newfound confidence to don it once again.

Recently I bought a 1981 car that to my delight housed a tape deck.

Cassettes are truly cool. The indestructible translucent plastic, the frailty of the spool, the undeniable hiss and of course the technological back flip – the ‘auto-reverse’.

My son also looked bemused. It reminded me of when he saw his first VHS player was whilst visiting his grandparents. The front loading machine with the Fisher Price-esque tapes were a constant source of intrigue. ‘You have to wait while it rewinds, that’s cool’. Thank God Betamax never took off. Video cabinets would require their own conservatory.

Cassettes are ingrained in our memory. For me, parties at my mum and dad where people came around with cassettes (or was it keys?). A pile of E-coloured BASF tapes each with the words ‘Various’ scribbled on in Bic. I remember fondly the Maxell ads where the David Byrne suited model gets hit by a tsunami of sound. And surely the tape was the first to introduce breaking the laws of piracy en-masse. The record/play manoeuvre whilst trying to tape the latest Modern Romance hit without the intervention of Steve Wright was truly an art. Like trying to catch water with one hand with a push button tap. Reactions of steel required.

C90, C30 or C120 (always snapped) was the first decision, then the brand. I was always a TDK man, Germanic, efficient. The hard man of all tapes. I always went for Chrome – which pre-laser disc or CD was as good as it got. So, to the coolest eject ever, the mini-gatefold and the illegal download pioneer – we salute you.