Soda - Keeping Curious

I seemed to have ended yesterday’s post on a bit of a cliff-hanger. Re-reading it, it might appear as if I couldn’t be bothered to explore Proust’s point of imaginative possession any further. After all, if you’re looking for the full discourse, Alain De Button delivers the point beautifully in ‘How Proust can change your Life’. Believe me he makes a much better job of ‘selling’ his point-of-view than my ham-fisted retelling of it. In my rush to make the (his) point I almost failed to actually make it. However, I’m now looking to make amends by taking a bit more time, and giving myself the chance to have another stab at the topic.

One of the reasons for my failure to do ‘imaginative possession’ justice – besides being partly inept - was because I was in a rush to get my post published. It’s difficult to be poignant when you have three people (my partners in our new, soon to be launched Green agency) waiting for you to get off your laptop so that we can all start a session dedicated to answering the question ‘What’s our Vision for the new Agency?’.

Now, there are differing schools of thought out there as to whether spending time on having a Vision is in fact time well spent in the first place. I’m happy to go along with the general notion that it’s far better to have a vision that imaginatively describes the idealised state your Company might have attained in three years time, especially on the simple basis that it’s always best to start with the end in mind. If you can make your corporate vision compelling, engaging and imaginative enough by applying this Proustian principle, you no doubt have radically increased your chances of making that vision a reality. So here’s the new thinking bit I’m going to try out. It struck me that if you did in fact take the Proust/De Button observation regarding imaginative possession, and then applied it to the company visioning-thing you might just be able to super-charge the whole exercise. Remember imaginative possession is about being able to conjure-up a compelling mental picture, complete will fully functioning sensor-round, of the thing you most desire.

Proust conjectured that we only come to really know someone or something through imaginative possession. To go on and then eventually possess that someone or something might, disastrously, lead to a dimming of one’s full appreciation of it. Proust believed a lack of appreciation was to be avoided at all costs, as it led to the deadening curse of habit. So be careful of what you wish for, because, having obtained it, you might end-up appreciating it less than when it remained that longed for object of desire.
On the way home tonight I’m going to replay that particular section on the audio book and see if my Proustian ‘vision mash-up’ might have some mileage.

The audio book is such a great way to both pass the time on a journey and a marvellous way to be entertained, as being read to can be a real delight. I’ve owned and read and re-read a copy of Alain De Button’s “How Proust can change your Life” for a while now, and find De Button’s often tongue in cheek insights about Proust and what Proust can tell us about the Good Life endlessly fascinating - a faultless reading by Sam West only adds to what at times seems like a mini series of ‘Madeliene’ moments.

Driving home last night I was struck by this little Proustian insight, which tells me a lot about what we marketers’ might have know for a long time, but haven’t necessarily articulated, namely that the our most longed for possessions are in fact imagined possessions. The narrator relates the story of two women, one a wealthy Duchesse, the other a impoverished lady on the fringes of Society. The Duchesse can possess any dress she wishes for, and often on a whim will turn up at the dress maker to have the latest fashions run-up. She possess so many dresses that they cease to be either special or worthy of much reflection and admiration. On the other hand, the woman with slender means dreams about having a new dress. In her imagination she traces every stitch, every fold, can feel the luxurious quality of the fabric - in short she knows all there is to know about the craftsmanship of that dress and the skill involved in dress-making. For Proust, and no doubt for many of us, imaginative possession leads to a greater understanding, and a greater love of the object we most desire than a lot of the possessions we’ve already surrounded ourselves with.

Currently, my mind is juggling a number of competing ideas, put forward by various authors, on a variety of subjects. As someone who thrives on eclecticism, I’ve always been intrigued by trying to extract knowledge out of a variety of sources and then create an overall view based upon those sometimes competing views. This week, as you know, I’ve been reading John Grant, Seth Godin and AC Grayling but it’s from Walter Benjamin that I’ve gained a really cherished new insight. It’s to do with a concept I’ve called “fragments”, and how our lives can be informed by a wide variety of everyday objects, each one offering an insight into the relationship we have with the world, based upon the significance we bestow upon that object and it’s power to evoke strong memories from our past.

In the case of Benjamin, his fragmentary world was made up of, amongst other things, cherished collections comprising picture postcards and childrens books; objects that were capable of conjuring up memories of a stifiling childhood that was instrumental in forming his adult worldview (we all tend to start collecting in childhood, if its only some of our most cherished memories). His archival approach to interpreting the world completely suited a man who spent his life documenting in great detail his relationship to the world.

As a marketer, it’s struck me how much of marketing is based on a similar notion of working with “fragments” - fragments of stories and images, especially childhood-related ones, the kind that have the power to evoke strong emotions within us. I’ve not fully worked this idea through yet, but feel that in a world where we increasingly employ shorthand methods to create and recieve communications, there’s definitely food for thought here, and a line of thinking I’m bound to pursue further.

I got all fired up by a book review I read over the weekend regarding the German philosopher/observer/chronicler of modern life Walter Benjamin. I was straight on to Amazon and ordered his biog and the recently published ‘Archive’ book, which documents Benjamin’s famous habit of writing his thoughts and insights on scraps of paper, menu cards, bus tickets; those discarded by-products of everyday life.

Perhaps it’s a question of one man’s litter being another man’s recycling project, being another man’s reading material. I personally think it’s great that at age 49, I’m still as excited as a 9 year old waiting for a parcel to arrive in the post. I’m off to a meeting in Birmingham today, and the post doesn’t usually arrive until mid-morning earliest, so I won’t (disappointedly) know if the books have arrived ’til later. No doubt the outcome of my Benjamin reading will start to turn up in these posts. I read somewhere once that you should learn something today as if you’re going to teach it tomorrow. I’m guessing that there’s a lot that Walter Benjamin can teach me and that he’s no doubt as relevant today as he was over 60 years ago. Perhaps life, and the living of it, never really changes.

I went out one lunchtime last week and came back with a bundle of business books. First off the rank has been Seth Godin’s latest, Meatball Sundae, which I raced through in a day. As readable as ever, Set Godin is the master of brevity, taking profound marketing ideas and encapsulating them in a few sentences. I’m going to be using the term “New Marketing” from now on, as well as tracking the 14 trends mentioned. Upping the anti, I now have two books on the go, The Choice of Hercules by AC Grayling, one of my favourite commentator’s on 21st Century life, and the other is The Green Marketing Manifesto by ex-St Luke’s man John Grant. Our soon to be opened ‘Green’ marketing agency sees me getting my thinking pointing in the right direction around this whole issue of sustainability. I’ll be posting future reactions to both of these books, which appears to me to have the common theme - hopefully not strecthing a point - of how ‘best’ to live the good life.

We’re looking at the possibility of launching a green agency. One that looks at sustainable communications, a carbon neutral approach perhaps. It first came to me towards the end of the summer through a chance conversation (isn’t that the way all great ideas start, rather than forced out of a strategy session!). It’s an interest area that has been building in my mind for many years now - a member of the Soil Association back in 1981 no less! We commissioned an indie consultant who has experience client-side, agency side and also good insight into the environment. I’ve been working with them for the last 12 weeks to evaluate the business case.

Now I don’t imagine that we’re the only ones looking at this right now, but having spent the time immersed in it with some of top brains in marketing, it’s going to be incredibly difficult. For this reason I suspect many agencies will make it easy for themselves: we recycle our paper, buy our energy from renewable sources and put lagging in the loft … oh .. and we’ll plant a few trees too just for good measure. Carbon Offsetting you know! Schezam!! A Green Agency. Anyone conned by that flaky green proposition frankly deserves all the bad advice and service they’ll get.

To do this properly will require an understanding of these issues that few of us in this industry currently have (including us) right now. It will also require dedication and a tenacity that will test even the best to the limit. Patience will be key. And people will need to put principles before profits - check that one out with shareholders first!!

And please don’t get ethical and environmental confused. I may buy my Fair Trade asparagus because it helps South American subsistence farmers, but it’s not very green is it flying little green shoots around the world. Sure, many people that care about ethics also care about the environment, but that doesn’t connect the two motivations.

I could say lots now about our early thoughts, but I’ll save that for later. Besides, they may well change as we unravel the complex motivation of the environment.

So will we ever see Together Green or what ever it might be called. Well, our research will be concluded by the end of the month and if we go ahead the agency will be up and running by the end of February 2008.

I welcome any thoughts, so please comment, send me stuff, whatever. The good, bad and the indifferent.

I’ve been meaning to post a fair few articles for ages now on a few subjects, but the studio has been very busy and I just haven’t had time. I thought I would author them outside of the office and post them when I got in, but you all know how that story goes.

Anyway, apologies aside, I just read a rather brief article posted by the BBC that sums up all of my concerns in one shot.

Tech rant: Technical ignorance

I suggest everyone reads it and takes away the notion that while people may disagree about the civil liberties issues, you cannot escape the fact that the government clearly gets the technical facts incorrect (or explained to them by the marketing drones at the company trying to sell the technology).

There is lots of room for expansion on the subject which I may do here when I get the time.

I was lucky enough to check out the Fabrica exhibition at the Pompidou Centre this week. It was one of those exhibitions that truly makes you think and reminds you why you got into this business in the first place. It was a bit of a wake up call to say the least.

Fabrica is a multidisciplinary school come research centre come cultural hot house for ideas from up and coming creatives around the world, covering everything from film and photography to graphic design, advertising and creative writing. To give you an idea of how good it was, we spent four and a half hours mooching around the exhibition, despite the lure of fine red wine and even finer cheese just outside…

The exhibition is on until the 13th November if you’re looking for a good excuse to skip off to Paris for a couple of days.

I have just been checking our site stats and this week our blog has had 14 visits from the Unilever network. Unilever is of course Dove’s parent company. I also noticed that the Dove videos on YouTube seem to have a lot of comments from someone claiming to be a Dove employee. This would suggest that Dove are taking the time to find out what the internet community thinks about their new advertising campaigns and are keen to get feedback from everyday people like you and me. Good on you Dove, another string in your friendly advertising bow!

Whilst it’s refreshing to see a major brand like Dove promoting beauty in a more realistic and responsible way, it’s a little worrying that it’s a multinational (Dove is a Unilever brand) that’s sparking the debate over ‘what is beauty’?

I agree with Becky’s blog entry, beauty is something that’s been revered and aspired to since the dawn of time. The pursuit of beauty is a part of every culture and always has been. In many ways that’s a positive thing of course. Anthropologists would say that physical attractiveness signifies health and fertility, whilst culturally, the aesthetic debate over ‘what is beautiful’ has inspired countless artists, poets and philosophers. Like Becky, I don’t think there’s anything wrong with the pursuit of beauty in this sense, it’s a part of what sets humans apart, emotionally and intellectually.

The trouble is, that now, beauty isn’t just an aesthetic ideal, it’s a billion pound global industry. So when Dove sparks the debate over ‘real beauty’ it’s not doing it from a philosophical point of view, it’s doing it to sell more products. That’s not to say I don’t like the campaign - and if it makes a difference to the way that young girls and women feel about themselves then that’s all good. The point I’m trying to make is that whilst beauty sells, the debate over ‘what is beautiful’ is always going to be influenced by the big players, that handful of multinationals that control the billion pound beauty purse.

The debate is always going to be interesting though, on the one hand, there’s the rise and rise of cosmetic surgery and products designed to help us look younger, from anti-wrinkle creams to Botox. And on the other, a growing population of older people that beauty brands can’t afford to ignore. To be fair to Dove, they’ve already included older models in their campaigns, and this is surely something that ‘clever’ brands will have to consider if they’re to keep up with changing trends in society. I have no doubt though, that the cult of youth will continue to thrive, with women in particular, under pressure to look young for as long as possible.