No can do Cannes?

This year alone there are eight new categories, from Independent Agency of the Year to a Grand Prix for charity and public service ads and a host of new Craft awards.

Logical deduction

It is probably logical to assume that the economic situation is playing a major role in Cannes hyping up the action and working on the premise that the more awards there are, the more entries there will be. Which in turn will lead to more finalists and hence more people tempted to make the increasingly expensive journey to France on the off chance of being able to pick up what has become one of the world's most prestigious awards.

From the point of view of pure mathematics, it makes sense.

But, I am not altogether sure that the recession is the only reason that many of those, who in past years would not miss Cannes for anything, are perhaps wondering whether it's still a good idea.

No more gambling

There is no doubt that, even without the recession, the increasingly high cost of marketing around the world has led more and more clients to give serious thought to moving away from gambling on clever big ideas, that might or might not work, to start insisting on accurate measurement and return on investment calculations ahead of spending those big budgets.

Ever since the Budweiser "Wassup" campaign showed that Cannes Grand Prix winners don't necessarily perform in business terms (in this case, the campaign lost market share and sales) there has been a move toward looking at advertising spend as an investment, rather than a roll of the dice

Days are numbered

Certainly, if one looks at the world's marketing trade media and what CMOs are saying, there is very little doubt that the days of taking chances with advertising are numbered.

And it is probably reasonable to expect that as big brands become more and more infatuated with the notions of measurement and ROI, they will become less enamoured of glitzy awards.

It probably won't be long, I reckon, before big ad awards organisers start reading the writing on the wall and start adding practical performance and results-based categories to their overhyped subjective judgement by peers of creativity only.