What’s the BIG idea?

So what’s the fuss about? What’s the big deal? Your phone’s got a camera and you got yourself an App. that assassinates cats at fifty paces; the office has hot and cold swinging doors and your Mother in Law’s bought a Jeep? – “Hey guys, his Mum’s bought a Jeep!”.

We’ve got iPads, food mixers that toast, roast and bake. Vacuum cleaners that perambulate rooms when you’re not at home, returning to their stations automatically when they’re running out of charge. We got a lipstick that’s a mascara and toothpaste too and to polish it all off, some bright spark has developed a pair of specs which lets you see the internet as you’re driving. And I think it’s great, all of it, love it, bring it all on, more and more again.

I love innovation and I can’t get enough of it. Then again I’m an unusual cove who loves change; but I digress. Have you every considered who comes up with these great advances? The conceptualisers, the thinkers, the Steve Jobs of the world. Most are well rewarded by consumers who swarm the stores to buy the manifestation of their ideas like seagulls around a sandwich.

But concepts cost money, although you wouldn’t think so if you worked in the world of advertising. Concepts are for thinkers and thinking generally is considered a luxury none of us can afford. I’ve had one or two clients tell me, “We don’t pay you to think” and at that very moment I can believe them, because they’re not engaged in the practice either.

It may not seem obvious but building an advertising concept isn’t a mindless, drug induced process, though I am told in some countries the salt shaker gets raided around 3pm on the late shift. I can however assure you that at Jack in the box it’s not that easy. We are engaged to do as much thinking as we can, devising concepts which beautifully project the client, while entertaining and informing the consumer. It has to be worked on, laboured and what the client doesn’t see is the concepts which never hit the art desk; the ones that fill the waste paper basket and have the delete button running hot.

So next time you see a great advertisement or even a good one, remember that it all began as a thinly veiled concept, fertilised by thought, watered and tested until it was shaped into the visual persuader that makes you turn to the wife and say, “Good Ad!” And while you’re at it, remember it all happened because someone engaged in that politically unpopular, luxurious, time honoured exercise called ‘thinking’. We believe it pays to think.