COMMERCIALS 30
181 Wardour Street, London, W1F 8WZ t 020 7494 0747
01BLINK PRODUCTIONS
www.blinkprods.com
md James Studholme exec prod Blinkink Bart Yates exec prod Blink James Bland directors number 2nd commissions 6th peer 2nd awards 7th top ads/directors 3rd credits The Long Wait by Dougal Wilson for Adam & Eve/John Lewis; Roof by Benito Montorio for DDB/ Volkswagen
It took fi fth position two years ago in the Commercials 30 and it came in second last year behind Rattling Stick, but this year Blink Productions makes it to the top of the poll. And that may have come as a surprise to Blink itself at the beginning of the year. Exec producer James Bland says that although “this past year has been quite robust” the company was “not expecting to be as busy as we have been.” In many ways, Blink has managed to buck the trends. In recent times, as budgets have been restricted it’s got harder and harder for any production company to remain creatively impressive – but Blink has. It’s created some outstanding commercials work, much of it down to a certain John Lewis and a certain Dougal Wilson who’s Always a Woman spot for the brand still remains one of the most loved ads of recent times. Blink
Johnnie Walker Keep Walking Brazil
could also point to work like its inspirational Benito Montorio directed Johnnie Walker spot featuring disabled triathlete Marc Herremans, and the animated fi lm by Blinkink director Joseph Mann for charity The International Exchange as examples of its creative resilience. But even though Blink has managed to place fi rst in this year’s poll of the top UK commercials production companies, Bland says the focus is shifting further away from the straight 30-second spot. “Our main opportunities for the coming year will be non- advertising work,” he says, which would have been a bizarre thing for a company so well versed in the art
of the traditional spot to have said only a few years ago. But as brands promote themselves more and more through other mediums, Blink wants to go on that journey with them. “We want to stay focused on how brands engage with their consumers,” says Bland. “The trend is less through traditional TV advertising as an interruptive media and more through brand participation and direct engagement. Branded content will probably dominate in the future.” And, at some point, a company like Blink might even fi nd that making adverts in their traditional sense is only a tiny aspect of what it does as a business.
02 RATTLING STICK
www.rattlingstick.com
39-43 Brewer Street, London, W2 4RS t 020 7851 2000
key management Johnnie Frankel, Daniel Kleinman, Ringan Ledwidge directors number 33rd commissions 22nd peer 1st awards 8th top ads/directors 1st credits Diner by Daniel Kleinman for TWBA/John Smiths, Quest by Ringan Ledwidge for Mother/Stella Artois
It’s spent the last two years at the top of the Commercials 30 but this time the home of some of the most well respected directors in the sector just steps down very lightly to second position. Rattling Stick has, as always, produced some of the outstanding commercials of the past 12 months but even the home of Ringan Ledwidge, Danny Kleinman and Andy McLeod says it’s concerned with “maintaining the calibre of our creative output”
C12
www.televisual.com | November 2011
Walls Garage
and “ensuring we continue to grow fi nancially without compromising our standards”. Rattling Stick says it’s enthused about the creative possibilities of work outside the traditional commercial but worried
about managing it fi nancially and “managing our profi t margins and growth as we move into other forms of ‘communication’, which historically have signifi cantly lower budgets.”
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44