Adam Ferrier: What Adland Can Learn From Sin City

Thinkerbell’s Adam Ferrier (second from left) has been over in Las Vegas judging for the London International Awards (LIA) and he told B&T that adland can learn a lot from the gambling capital of the world.

“Vegas is, without doubt, the world’s home of hedonistic creativity. When you go there, it’s really interesting because Vegas knows Vegas so well,” he said.

“Every brand in the world can learn from how Las Vegas understands itself and continues to evolve — the Sphere is part of that”.

Australian agencies won big at the LIAs this year, with AIRBAG, VMLY&R Melbourne and The Monkeys scooping the gongs for Ambient & Activation, Creativity in the Metaverse and Integration.

“It’s great to see Australians doing really well again. “Fitchix” [produced by AIRBAG and VMLY&R] was very prevalent and it did really well. It’s such an integrated weird idea. It can go across lots of different categories and do well in all of them — a bit like Tuvalu [The Monkeys “First Digital Nation” Campaign]”.

In Ferrier’s mind, Las Vegas’ understanding of itself and what makes it unique gives the city a sense of direction and momentum — something that every brand should have and creatives need to grasp to produce great, award-winning and impactful work.

“It gives [Las Vegas] ironically, and this sounds like a moronic thing to say, a purpose. They know what their place is and it’s hedonistic fun, so therefore they keep on upping the ante in terms of the direction for the brand,” he explained.

“There’s an iconic restaurant called Heart Attack Grill where if you’re over 350 pounds, you eat for free. There’s the new stadium where the Raiders are playing, there’s the [Formula 1] Grand Prix going straight down Las Vegas Boulevard. The city has momentum because it has direction”.

The Sphere concert venue is another example of this purpose.

“The Sphere was amazing. It was amazing how quickly it became Insta-famous. It’s because they put the art on the outside and everybody could take a video of it and share it around. The inside experience delivers again. It’s incredibly immersive and intimate but also has this awe-inspiring scale. It was like collective social augmented reality,” he said.

“It gives a bit of direction for where augmented entertainment is going to head in the future”.

However, this sense of purpose and direction — as crude and unethical as it may seem to outsiders — can serve as a point of inspiration for brands and businesses.

“The ones that won the Grand LIAs in the category that I was judging were big businesses with massive purpose-drive ideas that will result in more profit for the organisation. Mastercard was one and Corona was the other. The purpose of purpose is profit for these large organisations.

“Profit and purpose can build on each other. There’s very little advertising now in advertising awards shows. Traditional advertising now only probably belongs to two of 20 different categories. Most creative agencies occasionally might do a few ads but most of what they do has to be far broader, bigger and multifaceted”.

MasterCard’s “Where To Settle” campaign, produced by McCann Poland, saw the company use data to help Ukrainian refugees set up in small towns and villages where there were more immediate opportunities for housing and work.

Corona’s work, produced by Draftline, Shanghai, saw the brand take action to ensure that China could produce its own limes — it had previously produced the fewest good quality limes in the world — partnering with impoverished lime farmers to boost their yields with advanced tech.

“They’re not thinking how to connect emotionally with their consumers. That’s not the starting point of those conversations. The start point of those conversations is ‘How do we help and what can we provide in order to make the situation better?'”

Who would have thought advertising could extract purpose and direction from Sin City?

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Adam Ferrier Thinkerbell