Cannes Book

Background

Clients rely on advertising agencies for their knowledge and expertise. As an agency that runs on strong ideas and is careful to keep informed of what is happening in the international field of advertising and marketing, Action Ambros wanted to excite and motivate one of their clients about the possibilities that advertising can offer (specifically direct marketing), demonstrating how powerful the medium is and how they could benefit. Action Ambros's CEO, Andrew Ambrogioni, attended the Cannes International Advertising Awards in France. While there he was able to acquire footage of award winning international direct marketing campaigns. Armed with fresh ideas and insights, he decided to expose one of their clients, AIG, to what is current internationally in direct response marketing. He wanted to invite AIG to an afternoon where he could share his findings and knowledge, via an invite that was itself strong conceptually, re-iterating just how powerful direct mail could be.

Idea

Using the fact that taking this footage was actually prohibited was core to the idea of this invite. For such a creative, forward-thinking man to be privy to so many great ideas and not bring them home to share would have been an injustice. So he hid a camera beneath his jacket, and recorded work from some of the most creative talent internationally - hence the idea for a smuggled letter from a French prison. A story was created of how the CEO was 'stopped and held in a French jail…' for trying to smuggle this footage obtained illegally. While he was in jail, he wrote a letter to his staff on the back of an old movie poster which would have been hanging in his cell, explaining to his staff his situation, yet his delight at the same time knowing that with his AIG Insurance Travel Policy, he would return home soon with his wealth of knowledge.

The letter was then placed into the centre of a hollowed out French book (obtained from the book trolley in prison) and sent to his staff. Due to the fact that the client’s product (travel insurance) came in so handy, in return he asked that AIG staff be invited to view this footage with him at an informal function at the agency. A total of 26 books were hand delivered to the AIG staff. The individually hand-made letter was accompanied by an official Action Ambros headed letter from the Client Service Director responsible for the AIG account. This letter explained to the recipient the reason for the delivery of the book and also doubled up as the formal invite to the Cannes Showreel viewing session at Action Ambros.

Results

The clients were so taken with the concept, they had 100% attendance.

Target Audience

AIG staff

Size

26 books

Our Thoughts

This well-crafted and slightly crazy idea is certainly dramatising the proposition: valuable market information has been smuggled back from abroad. I think, however, you've got to be careful with such flights of fancy because the recipient may sometimes struggle to see what's in it for them. Remember what Gossage said: "when baiting the mousetrap with cheese, always leave room for the mouse." SH