On May 13th 2011 the Jonge Honden (Ad Pups) were given 24 Hours to create a concept for HEMA and win a trip to Cannes. All photos here.

Last Thursday we visited the Jonge Honden (‘Ad Pups’) 24-hour pitch, held at the headquarters of ‘client’ Red Bull, in Amsterdam Noord. The prize: 3 tickets on the Jonge Honden bus to Cannes next month and representing the Netherlands in the international Young Creatives contest. Red Bull’s briefing asked the teams to create an integrated concept around nightlife. The jury consisted of Tim Voors (freelance), Mischa Schreuder (SSSS&Orchestra), Mervyn ten Dam (Achtung!), and Peter Hamelinck (EuroRSCG). Only two teams won (in picture – taken by Roy Laros – from left to right): Daniël Sumarna and Bryan Wolff (WdKA) and Ramin Bahari & Judit Kun (Tribal DDB). Joey Boeters from Jonge Honden; “These two teams clearly stuck out compared to the rest and that’s why we’ll choose the third team based on the submitted portfolio’s” The third team will be announced later this week. We visited the teams on Thursday around 4pm, just after the deadline passed and interviewed three of them. Most of contestants only slept for a few hours – if at all – so they were clearly very groggy, but also very happy to answer some questions.

Nanette Visser (27) and Nik Sluijs (24) – work 3 days a week at N=5 and 2 days at the Willem de Kooning academy.

Though this is Nanette’s first Jonge Honden pitch, she calls herself ‘old’, cause she’s almost too old to be allowed in the competition. Nik is a bit younger, but more experienced; this is his third pitch. Is there an advantage, being experienced? Sluijs: “The advantage was that I was less stressed towards the end. Besides that, I didn’t get too easily distracted and realized we just needed to play our own match.” Satisfied? Sluijs: “More than the previous times, yes.” Did you guys drink a lot of Red Bull? Visser: “Yes, I did, there were quite a few different flavours and I wanted to try them all out.” What are you doing tonight? Sluijs: “I have to DJ at a beach club in Castricum aan Zee until 2 in the morning.” You gotta be kiddin’? “Well, I also need to make some money. Especially when we’ll win and go to Cannes”

Wouter Kampman and Marcel Haasdijk (both 24) – work at DraftFCB.

Kampman and Haasdijk came by car, so at 3 in the morning they quit and tried to sleep in the car. Kampman: “Well, it was not really sleeping, but at least we could chill out a bit.” Winning concept? Haasdijk: “Well, you never know what they are looking for, but we asked what the Jonge Honden thought and they didn’t disapprove. So that’s at least something.” Did you drink a lot of RedBull? Haasdijk: “I first did, but at some point it started to mess with my head, so I quit.” Kampman: “There was plenty of RedBull, but not enough beer. That was really a bummer!” Haasdijk: “Hey, watch out what you say, we still need to win that ticket to Cannes!”

Stefan Rijsmus (26) and Tayfun Sarier (24) – study at the Willem de Kooning academy.

Does it help to have some working experience when you’re pitching here? “Yes, it definitely does” the team says. The team has done an internship at Jung von Matt. How did you arrange the internship? Sarier: “We just sent some e-mails to the coolest agency’s in the world and Jung von Matt was the only agency that replied. We worked there for 6 months and after that they wanted us to stay longer. We’re also welcome once we’ve finished our studies.” So you’ll go back? Sarier: “Don’t know. We’ve also talked with RGA. That would be our dream.” Did you drink a lot of Red Bull? Sarier: “I drank 6 or 7, but only because that was the only drink that was cold.” How did the pitch go? Sarier: “The subject ‘nightlife’ might have been in our advantage, cause we’re experts in going out.” Winning concept? Sarier: “Well, you never know, but we still have two chances, cause we’re also nominated for the Future Lions, organized by AKQA.” Rijsmus adds: “But the chance to win here is much bigger, cause there’s less teams to compete with.” (in total 24, AAB).

Photo: Maurice Mikkers
The biggest winner last night at the ADCN (Dutch Art Director’s Club) awards was Lemz. All the ‘bulbs’ – of which one was a Grand Prix (the very best integrated work) – went to their Fireworks campaign. Our very favourite campaign of the year Domino’s Pizza Pepperoni by Indie won one Golden and two Silver bulbs (TV, internet and activation) – in our opinion it was at least as good as Lemz’ work. Wieden also won one Gold and two Silver for Heineken’s ‘The making of The Date’ (internet, TV, and activation). Selmore won Gold for Bavaria and Hugh Heffner – so we can be sure that Charlie Sheen will also win Gold next year. We were a bit surprised that N=5 won Gold for Telfort – not really our taste. Y&R won one Gold and two Silver for LG’s ‘smart thief‘ (internet, TV, and viral). A bit strange that alle these films are winning different prizes for the different channels through which they are broadcasted – does the channel matter? Another one of our favourites was Hema’s with a push-up bra in print, promoted by a male model, going viral big time – by Doom & Dickson. It won Gold and Silver. Note: Hema is one of the most down to earth department stores in the Netherlands. TBWA won Gold with its print campaign for DIY chain Gamma; free Lego – “Just like dad.” In Interactive Tribal DDB won Gold and Silver for ‘Obsessed with Sound’ for Philips. One of the most impactful commercials of the year by Publicis for ALS won Silver – “I have died by now.” Special bulbs went to Mischa Rozema (for directing OFFF), Christian Borstlap (art direction and illustration, for LV and Mr Porter), and Simon Warner (photgraphy, for Octopus).

Picture: ECD’s W+K Amsterdam Mark Bernath (left) and Eric Quennoy (middle), mainly responsible for Wieden+Kennedy’s huge success in Cannes and Enrico Balleri from Nike, just after the award ceremony last Saturday. What a great closing night for the Amsterdam agency it was. Nike Write the future scored seven more Lions – earlier in the week it already won gold in Cyber. At the most important award night the Amsterdam agency first of all won the prestigious Grand Prix in film. It was a very close finish with Puma’s ‘After hours athlete’ as jury chair Tony Granger (CCO Y&R) explained at the press conference. After a lengthy discussion he asked the jury to put all the rational arguments aside and vote from the heart. This gave Nike the final push. Nike also won five Lions in Film craft: two Gold (Editing and Script), two Silver (Production and Sound), and one bronze (CG). And the seventh Lion, Gold in Integrated, proved that the campaign didn’t just have a pretty face. And then Heineken; for this other power brand W+K won five Lions in Film and Film craft. Four for The Entrance: Film: Gold and Bronze (interactive). Film craft: Gold and Silver (Direction and Sound Design). One Lion went to The Date – more or less the sequel of The Entrance. It won bronze in Film. This brought the grand total for Wieden+Kennedy to 13 (!) Lions. Together with all the Lions that Portland won for Old Spice, W+K must easily be the most awarded independent network in the world. Two more Amsterdam Lions went to MINI ‘Flow‘ (Silver in Film craft) by BSUR and one to Volkswagen’s ‘Old Lady’ (Bronze in Film) by DDB. All in all Amsterdam (officially) won 25 Lions, 8 (!) more than last year.

Yesterday was a good day. Not just because it was our first day in Cannes and we enjoyed soaking up all its extremes – Le Palais, the sun, the beach, ‘le canard au miel’, and lots of drinks – check out our photo’s here. It was also a good day for Amsterdam, because it won 5 Lions! Two silver lions went to outdoor; Interbest ‘mail stripper’ and the Go Fast water-bike, both to Y&R Not Just Film. At the time, we weren’t too positive about the unattractive stripper, because we doubted its effectiveness. You could say the silver lion has proved us wrong. Two bronze lions went to the radio commercial ‘sexual harassment’ (Publicis) and an Allsecur outdoor ad (Ogilvy). In Media Muse and Starcom won Silver for their 3D Samsung projection. Earlier, on Monday Amsterdam won two meager bronze lions; the Dutch dress for Bavaria in promo – which definitely deserves more in our opinion – and bronze for Boondoggle’s KLM Suprise in PR – in Holland this won a golden Spin (read: cyber) award. Hopefully we’ll be able to celebrate some gold later this week.

Our first day in Cannes! We’re going to keep a photolog this week, so any tips on interesting (preferably Amsterdam related) activities are welcome – like winning a Lion for example. We look forward seeing you and (maybe) getting a little tipsy together!