What Men What

I don't profess to be an expert, but this article for CREATIVE magazine debunks some myths about marketing to men. It includes a word of warning from Southpaw's John Mckelvey when using sub-cultures like graffiti and skating to target young male consumers : "When some brands attempt to get all 'youth', it feels a bit like your dad rapping," says Mckelvey, who is co-founder of Sydney creative consultancy Southpaw.

I also enjoyed Nicholas Reynolds' - director at Curious - take on gender: "I hate the depiction of the modern male. He seems confused. Introspective. Guilty. Even of our human bodies. Let's get hair back. It's fucking crazy if you think about it. It's an outright rejection of our form of 'humanness'."

'What Men Want' appears in the Aug/Sept issue of CREATIVE, out today.

ADFEST, Tokyo (20-23rd July)

I just returned from a week in Tokyo as Editor of ADFESTbuzz and Lotus News atADFEST (Asia Pacific Advertising Festival).

ADFEST is an award show that’s passionate about nurturing creativity in the Asia Pacific. One of my favorite interviewees was Kazuyoshi Hayakawa, director at Camp KAZ Productions.

Not only is Kazuyoshi hugely talented (his commercials are famous in Japan and Thailand), but he’s the smiliest person I’ve ever met, and he has one of those wonderfully expressive faces that you never tire of looking at.

We had to speak via his translator, which is never the same as interviewing someone directly, but our conversations gave me a small taste of his philosophy and talent.

Steve Henry, HHCL

Last week I met Steve Henry, who was in Tokyo as Grand Jury President of this year's ADFEST Lotus Awards. I asked him about his vision for HHCL, which was one of the world's most awarded agencies in the '90s, famous for producing offbeat campaigns for brands like Pot Noodle.

Steve says HHCL had an almost perverse desire to break all the rules, "but hopefully with enough intelligence to make sure we were breaking the right rules." It worked for more than 15 years, until the agency sold to WPP and ultimately closed.

Steve was impeccably British and charming all week (although surely someone who has such a perversion for rule-breaking must have a darker side lurking beneath the surface!)

My interview is published here.