What’s the impact of the pandemic on you, your company, your approach to doing business in the future? What practices emerged that you will continue even as restrictions are loosening?
Over the last year and a half we’ve proven that we can be just as effective as individuals and as a company working remotely. Advertising is such a collaborative business. If you would have told me that day when we walked out of our office for what I assumed would be a few weeks would actually be 500+ days and counting I would have thought, “impossible, we will never make it!” Not only did we make it, we produced an award winning Super Bowl spot for Chipotle and managed to win several new pieces of business.
Ironically, I’ve found myself having many more 1:1s with my team and other department heads. We’ve worked hard at being more connected with people since we are not in person, and I don’t want to lose that as we move forward. I see a world where a hybrid model working from home and coming into an office could really be the balance that people have been yearning for all along. Now that we have experienced the benefits of both, I imagine people can be even more productive and efficient as we go into a post pandemic life.
How has the call for equity, racial and social justice affected, honed or influenced your sense of responsibility as a company in terms of the content you create and/or your commitment to opening up opportunities for filmmaking talent from underrepresented backgrounds?
VB+P is committed to building a more diverse and inclusive company. This extends to the vendors and suppliers we partner with. The work we put out into the world for our clients must also reflect these values.
As an agency, we were early adopters of Double the Line and have pledged with Free the Work and Change the Lens. On every job, we include underrepresented filmmaking talent with the intention of awarding director at least 25% of the time. And, at least 15% of the crew and department heads are diverse. We’ve also increased our use of underrepresented vendors/leads (edit, VFX, music/sound mix etc.) by 25%. I’m proud to say that we have already exceeded our goals this year.
In order to measure ourselves, we have developed tools to track our progress on each of our productions for Diversity & Inclusion both on and off camera, with DE&I wrap reports.
What’s the biggest takeaway or lessons learned from work (please identify the project) you were involved in that was or is in the running for current awards season consideration (i.e., Emmys, Cannes Lions, etc.)?
We had the fantastic opportunity earlier this year to develop a SuperBowl spot for our client Chipotle, entitled “Can a Burrito Change the World.” The spot features a young boy who rhetorically asks the question while highlighting the impact that Chipotle’s “Food with Integrity” standards could have on the world, including saving water, reducing carbon emissions and supporting local growers.
We’ve always admired Chipotle’s mission, however the production experience for this spot and other Chipole’s shoots over the years has had a significant impact on me and our team too. It’s been inspiring to see Chipotle’s strong partnerships with farms and farmers in action, and to witness these farmers’ incredible dedication to their craft. We’ve all personally learned a lot in this process, and are so proud of the work we’ve created together.
While gazing into the crystal ball is a tricky proposition, we nonetheless ask you for any forecast you have relative to content creation and/or the creative and/or business climate for the second half of 2021 and beyond.
Overall, I’m thrilled to see a lot of great momentum happening in the industry as marketers generally seem to be ramping up their spending and making greater investments after an exceedingly challenging and uncertain year. At VB+P, we’ve been fortunate to have won several new accounts recently. The energy and optimism is palpable and we’re all fired up to do great things for our partners. I don’t have any specific content creation predictions per se, though am encouraged to see and embrace the many ways we’re able to build brands and their communities these days, including innovative platforms like personalized experiences and Brand AI.
What are your goals, creatively speaking and/or from a business standpoint, for your company, division, studio or network in 2021?
VB+P is an independent creative company with scale that is hell-bent on driving outsized impact for our partners, and this will always be our core mission. We’re also very focused on continuing to grow our in-house capabilities to support our clients’ evolving needs and goals.
I’m particularly involved in the growth and evolution of our internal production arm, Lumberyard Productions, as well as our social media division, Taproom. Lumberyard is a one-stop shop that consists of video, digital + print production, editorial, motion graphics, and studio with production leads in each area. Lumberyard is able to deliver content across medium, channel, and project scope—from quick-turnaround, ephemeral content to evergreen, brand-defining content.
With Taproom, our ambition is to deliver outstanding creativity at the speed of the newsfeed. Inorder to do this well, we tap into culture seeking to find the things that radiate “social energy.”. We can be inspired by the social energy created by celebrities, a meme, a dance or sometimes other brands, with the aim to create ideas that are both disruptive and buzz-worthy. We’re also focused on bringing them to life in a way that is native to the social world in which they will live, and to increase the chance they will unleash their own social energy.
What trends, developments or issues would you point to thus far in 2021 as being most significant, perhaps carrying implications for the rest of the year and beyond?
Video advertising is still dominant but I see a shift to new innovative ways to use it such as live streaming and platforms like TikTok and Instagram Reels. Now more than ever, people are using their phones for a significant portion of their shopping, browsing, and entertainment experiences during stay-at-home advisories and country lockdowns. Therefore, they are less receptive to longer commercial videos. Easy to watch, short form video ads are becoming much more popular than ever before.
This mobile first approach provides information to people in real-time in which they can respond to instantly, and the intended audience is easier to target/track.
What work (advertising, entertainment)–your own or others–struck a responsive chord with you and/or was the most effective creatively and/or strategically so far this year? Does any work stand out to you in terms of meshing advertising and entertainment?
Audiences today are demanding action and accountability. Preserving our environment for future generations is top of mind for many and they want to see this reflected in the values of companies. For me, this was clear in the Super Bowl ad we did for Chipotle centered around sustainability. Chipotle’s commitment of positive real-world change is exemplified in this ad. To cultivate a better world, Chipotle’s real sustainability platform drives positive, measurable impact by changing the future of food. Because by changing the future of food, you have the opportunity to literally change the future and the world.
