What Happens When a Creative Department Gets 9 Briefs At Once?

A new campaign has launched just in time for the National Advertising Challenge (NAC) to issue its annual creative briefs to Canada’s advertising community.

Nine briefs have been issued, sponsored by Canadian marketers looking for solutions across nine categories (Big Ideas, Campaign, Student, Print, OOH, Wild Card, Not for Profit, Media Innovation, and Digital). The briefs are challenging participants to dream up the most unconventional solutions with the winning teams receiving a trip to Cannes, for the International Festival of Creativity in late June. Last year’s NAC competition garnered 200 entries, but the hopes are to double the amount of entries in 2015.

This year’s awareness campaign includes a humorous 90-second video that is intended to get the creative community talking about the challenge and differentiate itself from other creative showdowns like the annual Young Lions Competition. The online video was developed by local agency Zulu Alpha Kilo and depicts a stressed out creative resource manager who intercepts a young creative as he prints out a number of NAC briefs which she believes are surely going to cripple the already busy agency.

Formerly the National Advertising Awards (NAA), the show changed its name this year after facing some confusion in the market about what the show was all about. “We have big aspirations for the NAC, but we were facing a serious comprehension issues within the creative community.” says Ellie Metrick, Marketing and Communications Manager at NAC. “This year’s online video goes a long way in explaining that we offer creatives an opportunity to do original work in exchange for a chance to go to Cannes.” 

“The advertising community is hard to market to because their bar is so high when it comes to creative.” Says Zak Mroueh, Founder & Chief Creative Officer at Zulu Alpha Kilo. “The NAC is a great opportunity for creatives to face-off against the best in the industry and see how they stack up.” 

The video was directed by Pete Henderson, represented by production company “Someplace Nice” and edited by Chris Parkins at Rooster. The briefs go live March 2nd, with a deadline of March 30th. Judging takes place in early April by a panel of Canada’s Advertising elite and is co-chaired by CDs Ari Elkouby and Nellie Kim from Zulu Alpha Kilo and LG2 respectively. The Gala and awards ceremony will take place on April 30th.