Love Our Work: Paul Meates On The Forecast We Can Change
When advertising and societal change walk hand in hand there is a huge opportunity for real impact to be made.
It is often forgotten by those outside the industry that advertising has the power to achieve change. Advertising has the ability to sway a political campaign, raise money for those in need and bring awareness to the issues that aren’t spoken about.
It can create a new norm.
M&C Saatchi Australia partnered with the Minderoo Foundation to create ‘The Plastic Forecast’ The creation of this opened the conversation around the many microplastics that live within our world and called people to action with one simple sentence.
“This is a forecast we can change.”
Paul Meates, executive creative director of the CHEP Network discusses exactly why this works so well and what it means to be called to act, writes Casey Martin.
LBB> Firstly, why do you like this particular piece of work? Does it solve a problem in a creative way? Does it make you jealous? I want your professional and personal opinion on why the work is great!
Paul> When it comes to big societal problems - in this case the amount of plastic in our environment - we need something new to shake us out of our blissful ignorance. For all of us, it’s just too easy to push these issues aside. This issue in particular is something I care really deeply about, and yet before I saw this I had stopped actively caring, and was certainly not doing anything about the problem. When I saw it, I found myself faced with a new way to understand the scale of the problem. A visceral way to comprehend its impact. And it not only renewed my interest, it called me to act - “this is a forecast we can change”.
LBB> When looking for inspiration, do you believe it is important to look outside of your own agency?
Paul> We look for inspiration elsewhere. In fact, everywhere. But inspiration isn’t the only thing to take from external sources. There are other motivating factors that drive creative people. Not all of them are good. But they lead to good things. Sure, there’s admiration, and this work has all of mine. There’s respect, and an appreciation of how hard it is to make truly impactful work like this. But there’s also a jealous feeling that you want to be on the other side of, and there’s that competitive streak that makes us a bit pissed off, but drives us to think harder.
LBB> How do you hone your own creativity and how do you foster the creativity of the team around you?
Paul> Looking at great creative things is the best way to hone your own creativity I think. If you only look at good things, you’ll only know how to make good things. Good things in, good things out. You need to base your standard off the highest standard of everyone else. Which sucks, because you are setting a really high bar for yourself, and for those you work with. However, I find creative people want the bar to be painfully high. We’re a bit sick that way. We are excited to try meet it.
LBB> Lastly, what does creativity mean to you?
Paul> Creativity is usually associated with the moment of inception, when your mind fashions something out of nothing. But it obviously doesn’t stop there. It’s about crafting an idea to make it as emotionally resonant as possible. It’s about solving problems along the way. It’s about protecting the core of it as it goes through the wringer for 3 months of production. I think people applaud the first part mostly - but the rest of it is where the most incredible creatives I’ve ever met prove why they are great. I think anyone can make something that is like 90% good. But that last 10% is incredibly hard, only possible for a select few.
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