The advertising industry can be pioneering when it comes to gender diversity, ethnic diversity and mental health. However, one issue it tends to ignore is its liberal consumption of alcohol.
No industry event is complete without the obligatory tray of free booze on entry, while many agencies these days sport an open and free bar.
So, the results of a new US poll that show adland to be the most booziest profession during CV-19 lockdown arguably shouldn’t come as a surprise.
The survey conducted by Fishbowl received close to 13,000 responses from people working for companies that included JP Morgan, Facebook, McKinsey, Tesla, Bank of America, BCG, Deloitte, Amazon, Edelman, Nike, Google, KPMG, and thousands of others.
It posed the simple question: “Do you ever drink alcohol while working from home?”
The results revealed that the advertising industry admitted to being the heaviest drinkers during lockdown, with just shy of half (49.14 per cent) admitting they were drinking. The overall average of all occupations was 42 per cent admitting “yes”.
Adlanders beat off lawyers – who came second with 48.65 per cent – and accountants who came a distant third with 39.13 per cent.
Some 50.44 per cent of women who worked in advertising admitted they were drinking in lockdown, compared with 47.55 per cent of their male colleagues.
In terms of roles (with 25 or more responses), the top five that replied yes to the poll were senior art director (63.89 per cent), account manager (63.64 per cent), designer (57.14 per cent), creative director (56.52 per cent) and senior vice president (54.84 per cent). The bottom five were account executive (36.11 per cent), associate director (40 per cent), vice president (40.74 per cent), project manager (43.75 per cent) and director (44.19 per cent).
The latest study follows similar polls showing how CV-19 had affected the advertising and marketing industries. Results included:
- 31 per cent of employees say ‘less synergy with coworkers’ is the biggest obstacle while working from home
- 54 per cent of employees fear there will be layoffs at their company, due to fallout from Covid-19.
- 60 per cent of working professions said that the Covid-19 pandemic has caused clients to pause or cancel work.
- 62 per cent of working parents are unable to juggle working from home and childcare.
- According to teachers, less than half of students are showing up for their remote classes.
