Cannes Lions and the dialogues on race
- Maria Rifioti
- May 24, 2019
- 2 min read
Updated: Jun 1, 2020
It felt like a whole new world. It’s like one moment you are in Cannes, France, and the next you are at the Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity.
“Think More. Connect More. Create More.” That was the first banner I saw as we arrived at the location of the festival. I admit that it heightened how much I was looking forward to this experience.
The festival is a prestigious event that takes place every year in the month of June in Cannes. It is a conglomeration of pioneer professionals in all areas of advertising, marketing and public relations. All of these creative and innovative minds gather to have conversations about the future of the industry and showcase what that looks like now. Professionals from other industries were also present, such as singers John Legend and Tom Odell, and actor Justin Baldoni, to name a few.
Legend spoke with Marc Pritchard, chief brand officer of Proctor and Gamble. Yes, after their talk John did sing “All of Me,” but that was not the highlight of that session. It was awe-inspiring to see how interconnected advertising and social impact are, especially with the help of influencers like Legend. Stereotypically, advertising is perceived as manipulative and materialistic, pushing consumers to buy more and more. Cannes proves that this stereotype should be deconstructed. This session was focused on the partnership mission between Legend and P&G. They exhibited the campaign that gave continuance to their previous campaign, “The Talk” and created “The Look.” This is a perfect example of advertising opening up dialogues on race in the United States. By partnering with Saturday Morning they created a new campaign.
Geoff Edwards, a co-founder of Saturday Morning said, “When we partner with creative people who believe in the importance of equality and inclusion, we can create stories like we’ve never experienced before– because creativity loves diversity,” said P&G Chief Brand Officer Marc Pritchard in a statement. “And when we embrace creativity through humanity, we can literally change the world by using our voices not only as a force for growth, but as a force for good.”
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