Has our Pharma Lion lost its pride?

This is the blag I started writing before I was asked to be on Cannes podcast from the Creative Floor.

So some of this I already got off my chest. But anyway, as always, hope you enjoy.

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In 2014 a bunch of the brightest, best, tallest and most-potty-mouthed pharma people from all over the world, packed their cabin-bags and headed for the Cote D’Azure, their pharma campaigns tucked under their arms and the hopes of winning some real, proper, actual Lions in their dreams.

Finally Pharma had arrived.

It was a huge triumph for the Pharma luminaries, who were part of the consultant team advising Lions Health, to finally get us on the map and an equal standing to our consumer cousins.

Nobody really knew exactly what kind of work would win apart from hopefully the best work that the pharma world could produce from our day-to-day jobs, the TV spots, the IVAs, the conference booths surely?

Entries were in the gazillions*.

Yes, well…ahem…we quickly realised that wasn’t what would win.

TV commercials were shredded, branded work was thrown off the highest building, regulated work was tortured in the basement, pro-bono and disease awareness were allowed in through the side door by a sympathetic security guard.

Iron fishes, fake legs for swimmers and traditional Afghan beads were ushered onto the stage and rightly applauded.

Oh…that’s what wins, we all mumbled in to our Rosé.

But by and large it was a source for good, pushing the standard of creative work, inspiring people to do better. Making the world a better place.

Just don’t bother with all that, you know… pharma stuff. In the er… pharma category.

By 2018, the year I was on the pharma jury, there was about 600 entries. We were done by Saturday morning.

So cut to 2024, ten years later and the entries are down to 227. This resulted in 15 shortlisted items. The jury must have finished by tea-time of the Friday.

Just fifteen entries from the entire global pharma industry that were worthy of any recognition. And as you know, the allocation of how many Lions can be awarded is based on the shortlist.

So, one gold, one grandprix.

That’s your lot.

Now, you might think I am about to moan about the judges, or to encourage a more lenient approach.

I am not.

But something has happened in the ten years we’ve all being doing this.

That first year there was a lot of moaning about having the pharma work judged and awarded the weekend before the ‘main event’. We literally were the ginger step kid of advertising, or at least made to feel that way.

So a couple of years later they listened and included us in the main week.

But that also started the attendance-exodus and the deflating of the category. Now our section is tucked away by the toilets in the main palais.

Ok, so Covid didn’t help – just as it was all gathering steam.

But my sense this year was that Pharma agencies are not coming, at least not in the same numbers as they were, because… why bother?

Media companies and tech giants took their place. Consumer agencies found they could up their points by shoving entries into more categories like Health and Wellness if the criteria was just ‘purposeful’.

(Are guns a health and wellness issue because they kill or maim like a disease?)

Don’t get me started.

That’s fine, but Lions Health needs to do something to encourage those borderline ideas to get entered and get our wider community returning after Covid turned the tap off.

Here’s my thoughts for a rejuvenation of what was once the pinnacle of creative recognition, let alone inspiration.

Gone are the specific health based talks, gone are the small agencies who want to learn. Start the health part at the same time but put those talks back in a separate section if you have to. Health is not a category it’s an industry!

If even the CEO of one of the largest Health networks in the world was not ‘allowed’ (allegedly) to come by his Uber-bosses – what hope is there for the rest of our agencies? So introduce pass concessions for small health agencies with under 50 employees. The big CEOs can fight their own battles.

Stop putting people who have never been near an award, let alone a lion, on the juries. ( Maybe this is unfair but …) This is not a diversity issue, by all means be diverse of course, that’s essential, but the juries need to maintain that exceptionalism. It’s a small industry, you will run out of legit jurors if you don’t recycle a little, but look at the other awards shows too and who is winning, it just needs to have credibility.

I heard a malicious rumour (and therefore it must be true) that one big big winner this year was funded by the agency to the tune of several hundred K (and no, it’s not the agency we all suspect does this). I mean, good luck to them on one level, if you can’t beat them join them…but how can the rest of us compete?

Well here’s an idea.

Lower the cost of an entry for smaller agencies. Or a three for one system where agencies aren’t having to put all their eggs in one category for the price of a week’s stay in Monte Carlo. Very often, while judging, I heard something like ‘well if they’d entered it in this category it might have won or shortlisted’. Of course jurors can’t currently transfer entries to assist the entrants ( maybe allow one transfer to a category that the judges agree on?) but it might encourage the agencies to take a punt, it’s the ‘spread bet’ that gets you the big wins and your points up.

For example, and I’m using random off-the-top-of-my-head-categories, an entry in HCP animation could be a nice film but with outstanding use of sound, possibly a silver. But if it’s not entered in ‘best use of sound’ it remains a shortlisted entry without any recognition.

It’s sometimes prohibitively expensive to spread bet, so you put it all on one horse and hope for the best.

But obviously the work still needs to be good and if the category can’t muster the required level then so be it.

Finally, as we discussed on the podcast, I do think that making something and selling it to a client is a legit approach to business, after all it’s the way every other business operates apart from maybe hospitality. To my mind it doesn’t have to be a client RFP to be a worthwhile endeavour. It’s the problem solving that is important and if clients can then support that endeavour by sponsoring it, everybody wins. And if it somehow wins a lion, so much the better.

Anyway, I for one, think Lions Health is an important part of our industry and it would sadden me to see it wither on the vine. So keep entering, keep reaching higher and keep thinking ‘what if’.

You know that lot will be.

Let’s get it roaring again next year.

(*official number)