According to Chuck Porter, co-chairman of Crispin Porter + Bogusky, everybody is so concerned with the new technologies available today that they forget about advertisement’s essence: the story. And that’s why his speech, on last Friday, June 20, was entitled “All that really matters is the power of the story: If you are focused on anything else, you are wasting your time and resources”.

Porter divided the attentions with two other famous professionals in the advertisement world: Ajaz Ahmed, AKQA’s associate, awarded many times in many different festivals the digital agency of the year, and Joe Pytka, scene director, who has collected 110 Lions and Palm D’or for three consecutive editions – twice.

In his speech, Porter precisely positioned the current advertisements: “Today it’s easier then ever for people to ignore actions and brands, as the same time it’s easier than ever to make them fall in love with them”. Fair enough, if in one side we have all different types of media, capable of reaching any public in any specific way. On the other hand, the same amount of “possibilities” makes the consumer choose for only some of them, therefore, for some brands and some communication actions.

To demonstrate that, Porter and his guests exhibited some of their favorite pieces, which exalt the “good story”. Crispin’s co-chairman presented campaigns such as the Molson beer, whose campaign first announcement showed a man in the company of very cute little dogs and a beer bottle in hand. “The probable worst announcement we’ve ever done” jokes. But the real idea was in the announcement propagation and campaign sequel. The piece entered woman’s magazines so that women would empathize with the beer.

Sometime latter, more manly announcements were targeted to man’s magazines, with the objective of stating that women like guys who drink Molson better. Besides this campaign Porter exhibited films for the Burger King, in which a chicken dressed person did “sweet and not sweet” things, just like the chain’s sandwich. Making use of humor above all other advertisements genres, Porter highlighted some characteristics to help good stories be created, such as society values chock and daily jokes.

In Joe Pytka’s view, good stories are like jokes. “Some people know how to tell them, some don’t. And that ain’t something that can be learned” emphasized the irreverent and most awarded scene director in Cannes’ history. He paid tribute to directors and agencies responsible for films such as Pepsi and Madonna, in the nineties, or Nike Air Jordan; other than one directed by himself – still unreleased – for McDonald’s which includes soundtrack by Jorge Ben Jor.