One of the things that has always bugged me about adland is the ad ‘credit list’.
Sometimes you’ll read about a one-off print ad that has a longer credit list than a bloody movie.
Seriously.
Look, I get the importance of having your name on things – this is an industry obsessed with that – but it kind of gets ridiculous when people are mentioned because they put the stamp on the invitation for the client launch.
That’s why I always loved that Mother credited everything as Mother.
Sure, you could claim it robbed those involved in the making of the work from getting the credit they deserved – but I can tell you for a fact, there’s no way those people would be anonymous for long.
Of course the worst is when people take credit for things they didn’t really do.
Or big themselves up to make it sound like they were instrumental in what was created.
With that, I want to tell you a story that I heard from my friend – and creative extroidinatire – Kash Sree.
A long time ago – in the 80’s to be precise – there was a phenomenal writer called Richard Cook.
The creative director he worked for was notorious for not giving credit to the people who deserved it and had left Richard’s name off numerous previous pieces of well received work.
One lunch, the creative director handed Richard an ad and asked him to write some copy for it before he got back.
Richard – in a demonstration of his talent – wrote the piece over his lunch break.
It’s the ad at the top of this post.
The ad went on to win countless awards.
In an award-obsessed industry, Richard wasn’t exactly surprised that the creative director yet again denied Richard had anything to do with the work. So Richard unleashed his weapon.
He simply stated if anyone needed proof that he was responsible for the ad, they should read the first letter of every paragraph of the copy.
I’ll save you the bother. It spelled out ‘Richard Cook wrote this’.
Genius.