AHAA 2020 in hindsight. What I saw.

By Gonzalo López Martí – Creative director, etc / LMMIAMI.COM

-Showrunners: the Orcí clan.

  • Héctor & Norma Orcí made a showstopping presentation.
  • They spoke soflty and bandied a big stick.
  • You can agree with them or not.
  • Personally I don’t concur with every single statement they made.
  • But everything they said they said with class, flawless eloquence and candor.
  • Boy they left me thinking.
  • Note to self: order a copy of their book “The Latino way: rediscovering American values” and, workload permitting, write a review.
  • By the way, la agencia de Orcí is 30 years old already.
  • I have a certain weak spot for them, topped off with a whiff of professional envy, because they handle my dream client and favorite brand ever: Honda*.
  • AND they are based in Santa Monica, California, possibly my favorite patch of land on US soil.
  • Now let’s move on to the other Orcís, Acento’s CEO Roberto and his Hollywood hyphenate son and namesake, who stole the show too with a memorable fireside chat.
  • See, most sessions and forums in these types of industry gatherings tend to be thinly veiled self-promotional stunts.
  • Everybody is showing off how great they are.
  • Everybody’s track record is pristine.
  • It is a long litany of big hits & no misses.
  • Yeah, right.
  • The Robertos did indeed share a very cool case study of one of their recent efforts: the TV show Matador, which they coproduced with nephew/cousin Andrew (or is it Andrés?).
  • Matador ran last year on Robert Rodríguez’s El Rey network.
  • I saw an episode or two.
  • I really loved what they did.
  • An action thriller combining fútbol and espionage, with a superb cast of Latino talent.
  • It just so happens that Matador was, by some accounts, a failure: it only lasted one season and, for whatever reason, it didn’t sell well overseas.
  • It takes brass balls and loads of self-confidence to just go out in front of a room full of colleagues, competitors and potential clients and openly admit to a failure, if you know what I’m sayin’.
  • Said failure nevertheless still proved to be a breakthrough brand integration experiment with crucial learnings for anyone who wants to stay in this game longer than three years from today.
  • In any case, the Orcís at this point have absolutely nothing to prove.
  • Their track record, individually and as a clan, is awe-inspiring.
  • Acento is a bellwether of our industry and Roberto Jr’s career in film & TV is nothing short of meteoric.
  • Dude calls the shots alongside Steven Spielberg, JJ Abrams and Michael Bay.
  • Fanboys AND Hollywood bean counters worship the ground he walks on.
  • Hear that noise, sorta like meat sizzling on a grill?
  • It’s me seething with envy.
  • Disclaimer: I don’t know any of the Orcís personally but mutual acquaintances tell me they are the most genial of peoples, down-to-earth and totally devoid of arrogance.
  • Though a bit inclined to that quintessentially Latin of traits: nepotism (wink wink nudge nudge).
  • I don’t blame them.
  • Nepotism is why I christened my company after my last name.
  • Cuz I’d love for my kids to come work with me some day**.
  • My respects to the Orcís and their fiercely independent, trailblazing, family-owned & operated entrepreneurial spirit.
  • The dynasty has barely begun.

-It keynote speaker: Wendy Clark.

  • She’s powerful.
  • She’s charismatic.
  • She’s chic.
  • She’s glamourous.
  • She’s the Anna Wintour of the advertising world.
  • If she hasn’t given a TED Talk yet they should call her pronto.
  • She commanded the stage like no other keynote speaker.
  • Timed to perfection, never a flubbed syllable or a slip of the tongue.
  • Still, methinks her speech was an aggregation of neatly packaged, dazzlingly delivered platitudes.
  • The kind of one-liners you find at the business section of an airport bookstore.
  • Hey, I’m not criticizing her.
  • No, no, no.
  • How would I dare criticize an individual who was in charge of the most important commercial brand in the history of human civilization and now reigns supreme over a Madison Avenue legend?
  • If I had her resumé, her skillset and her responsibilities I wouldn’t either be going around giving away my hard-earned expertise and disclosing my professional secrets to strangers.
  • I am pretty sure though that, in the privacy of an agency client/conference conclave, when she can truly speak her mind, she must be second to none at creating and selling big money-making work.

-Other speakers of note:

  • Ernest Bromley. He received the Caballero Lifetime Achievement Award with a badass acceptance speech and wearing badass cowboy boots.
  • Clorox’s SVP CMO Eric Reynolds. He gave a wholehearted, energetic presentation full of cool work and noteworthy insights.
  • Univision’s Kevin Mills. He spoke with candor and energy about the demographic, cultural, digital & social challenges the mothership is confronting.
  • White Ops’ co-founder and general counsel Ash Kalb. He gave an eye-opening ultra rapid fire, infectious in every sense of the word lecture on the huge money pit of fraud that hinders the digital advertising realm.
  • Author & anthropologist Rich Benjamin. His bonzo research project in the deep recesses of Caucasian America -compiled into a book he titled Whiteopia- was a very cool, courageous and eye-opening, if slightly anecdotal, endeavor.
  • The Cledor Group’s Court Stroud. He did a great job at keeping the crowd alert and amused with his strident, loony emceeing.

-Miss AHAA 2016: Ariadna Gutiérrez.

  • Miss Colombia in 2014 and Miss Universe 2015 (for three minutes) is now LatinWE’s new big, bold, beautiful bet.
  • Aka the next Sofía Vergara.
  • Spontaneous, witty and ready to resort to self-deprecating humor.
  • Highly savvy in all things social media.
  • Thin but not horribly skinny.
  • Devoid of deforming plastic surgery, disproportionate implants or gaudy make-up.
  • Casually chic but not pretentious.
  • There’s a new Colombian goddess in town.
  • To deflect accusations of ageism, Iet’s say that in the female above-40 age bracket Mrs Clark was the hottest keynote speaker.
  • The hottest male keynote speakers?
  • I couldn’t tell.
  • Suggestions welcome.
  • Note to self: write a piece about Latinos and our backward fixation with beauty pageants.

-Big disappointment: the session with award-winning creatives.

  • If you have nothing new or nice to say, don’t say anything, right?
  • Whatev.
  • Alma’s case study is indeed a brilliant idea: turning Glad trash bags into camping tents and vice versa to help prevent littering on campsites and open air festivals is not just clever advertising, it is ingenious industrial design.
  • But I think we saw this same case study last year, didn’t we?
  • Nothing new to show, guys?
  • Same thing with Conill’s name stickers effort for Toyota: it is a great idea but I’m afraid it is from last year too, isn’t it?
  • Why are we dwelling in the past?
  • Or is it just déjà vu?
  • Just asking.
  • Some cute PSAs and assorted past-their-sell-by-date award-show-ready shenanigans were duly displayed too.
  • I know, I know: award shows are a necessary sand box to push the limits of our industry and keep it current.
  • Playing cat & mouse with truchos is a pointless waste of time (I fully agree).
  • Problem is, I found the salesmanship skills of this panel -or lack thereof- to be boring, flat, uninteresting, shallow.
  • In an attempt to work up the room, copious amounts of free alcohol were carted in.
  • The trick didn’t play out.
  • People were yawning and checking their phones 5 minutes into the session.
  • My suggestion: posturing, clumsy humblebragging, hipsteria and tired pompous one-liners out of a self-help book are not enough, folks.
  • If you are going to lecture and wag you finger at me, at the very least you gotta try to entertain me.
  • On the upside: one of the agencies presenting a case, We Believers, is a startup founded and commanded by a creative who’s willing to live and die by his own sword.
  • I wish him the best of lucks.
  • We sorely need more entrepreneurial creatives like him.

*Should you want to know why Honda is my favorite brand and my favorite company, please read this.

**Should you want to know my opinion about nepotism, read this.
 

 

Skip to content