Celebrating creativity only SA would understand
26 Oct 2017
The 2017 Pendoring Awards are just around the corner - taking place this Friday, 27 October 2017 at Vodaworld, they're now celebrating their 23rd year of putting indigenous SA advertising at the forefront. Carl Willoughby, ECD at OpenCo, lets us in on the essence of this year's Pendoring campaign.
Our mother tongues weren’t meant to be exported, just like some of our advertising shouldn’t be exported. But what makes advertising truly South African? The local insights? The richness of our mother tongues? Or the fact that no one else gets it? But if they don’t get it, it probably stands a good chance.
These are insights from this year’s Pendoring campaign announcing it was open for entries, where agency OpenCo made the bold move and checked whether global creative heavyweights understand truly local South African work.
This included the likes of Erik Vervroegen, head of art for TBWA New York; Tom Paine, creative director at Y&R New Zealand behind the acclaimed McWhopper campaign; and Joao Coutinho, Y&R’s North American group creative director.
Vervroegen responded: “What are you guys on about?”
Paine commented: “I don’t know what just happened,” and “If I got given that on a jury, we’d all look at each other with quizzical looks on our faces… but, being a Kiwi, I kind of empathise, no one really understands what I’m saying, either!”
Coutinho added: “It sounds like Chinese. It’s very South African. There are tonnes of festivals that want to be international, and you guys are proud of being a local festival. I think that’s really cool.”
So while they may not get what’s being said, they definitely get that the work is authentically South African and resonates with us. Proof that truly local only works here. That’s why Pendoring is known as the only truly South African advertising awards. While the winning entries may confuse those who don’t have more than English as a mother tongue, but that’s what makes it the truly South African advertising awards.
View Pendoring's manifesto video (in English below) for a sense of that SA pride the awards pay tribute to and that the judging panel held dear while going through the entries this year:
OpenCo's ECD, Willoughby, is this year himself one of the esteemed judges. Klerck confirmed that the fully representative judging panel was well equipped to assess and adjudicate work across the full spectrum of South Africa’s indigenous languages, excluding English.
On his favourite aspect of the campaign, Willoughby lists the content pieces they put together using Vervroegen and Coutinho, embedded above, as well as the ‘#UntranslatableMzansi’, where a Google Translate box was embedded on the Pendoring site to translate an Afrikaans word to English.
I gave it a bash by typing in ‘lekker’ in the Afrikaans box, and got ‘nice’ as the English translation. Not quite, Google!
Here, Willoughby lets us in on how they got those big global names to endorse the campaign, as well as the importance of celebrating creativity across all our local languages, especially as it’s so ‘local is lekker’…
Explain OpenCo’s relationship with the Pendoring Awards.
We were invited by Pendoring general manager Franette Klerck to develop the 2017 campaign. It presented a great opportunity as the Pendoring Awards moved on from just being an Afrikaans show. In the last few years, it also felt as though recognition here meant that you’ve got an understanding of what work resonates locally.
Pride in SA creativity, all the way! How did the ‘only locals will get it’ idea come about and what made it a winner?
We had a creative brainstorm session, where we booked the entire studio. Many ideas were thrown around. We identified three that we liked and presented them to the Pendoring team. This idea seemed to have the strongest insight that lent itself to some interesting work.
That it did. Elaborate on the importance of celebrating creativity across all our local languages.
If you don’t celebrate who you are, then what are you? Creativity for me is about the execution of a strong insight. And those insights can be global or local. What excites me about celebrating creativity in our local languages is that it makes a point about how ideas transcend language boundaries. There is an unfortunate approach to local work that I think is wrong. We should all strive to create world-class local work and celebrate it, because we have the ability to do it.
We shouldn’t develop in English and translate. We should develop work in the creative language and ensure its relevance to our target audience. Speaking to someone in their language in a way they understand is the key to being relevant.So when we don’t see that as being important, or something to strive for, then we’re perpetuating the current norm. Language is as important an avenue as direct marketing. It’s speaks to relevancy. If it is celebrated, then it helps make more brands see the values as well as our industry see the overall value of using the right language for the right audience.
Why were the three international creatives selected and what does their specific endorsement bring to the campaign?
Erik Vervroegen is world renowned. Adding him as a face to the campaign gives us more credibility and drives the point of “only locals will get it” home. He’s part of our network, so it was easier to reach out to him. Tom Paine was one of the most awarded creatives last year because of the McWhopper campaign. In the industry, everyone know that campaign so using him helps us profile the Pendoring Awards with our local creative audience.
Some of Joao Coutinho’s work over the past few years has also been highly awarded. He’s a typical international awards judge. It certainly was great reaching out to them and having them agree to participate in this campaign. Not everyone is prepared to have a Skype call with a bunch of strangers and read out copy in a language you have no understanding of!
What work did you show the international creatives that they just didn’t get?
We shared the Cell C “Igugu” radio campaign, Nando’s ‘parking guards’ campaign from a few years ago, as well as the FJ Cruiser TV ad from FCB.
We didn’t want to make a point about language only, but also insights. So in the mix, we had campaigns that were in local languages but also specifically campaigns that used very local insights. Their reactions were great. I think they were quite gentle with us!
Daar’s hy. We’ll be providing live coverage of the awards and will publish the winner list and exclusive comments in full. Click here for more of what to expect from tomorrow evening’s gala event, here for the full list of finalists, visit the Pendoring press office and follow them on Twitter and Facebook for the latest updates.
About Leigh Andrews
Leigh Andrews AKA the #MilkshakeQueen, is former Editor-in-Chief: Marketing & Media at Bizcommunity.com, with a passion for issues of inclusion, belonging, and of course, gourmet food and drinks! Now follow her travel adventures on YouTube @MidlifeMeander.
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