Brazil: Overview

Va va boom...Brazil steps on the gas

After winning 56 Cannes Lions and with AlmapBBDO bagging Agency of the Year as well as a Press Grand Prix, has the slumbering giant of Brazilian advertising finally realised its global clout? Isobel Roberts finds out what’s next for the country’s major players.

Now we wouldn’t want to be accused of exaggeration, but we’re going to go ahead and say it. Brazil, it appears, is booming. While other parts of the globe have suffered at the hands of economic crises over the past two years, South America’s largest country remains relatively unaffected. Ad budgets in the USA and Europe were slashed and jobs culled, but in Brazil the advertising community shouldered the aftershocks and powered on through. And the knock-on effects are showing. Always significant players on the international scene, recently Brazilian agencies have been stealing the limelight at awards shows. In 2009 they placed first (DDB) and second (AlmapBBDO) on the Cannes Agency of the Year scoreboard, and only midway through 2010 AlmapBBDO has already topped the list at both Cannes and the Clios, as well as several Latin American festivals.

“The consistency of doing a good job in all disciplines was an important factor in winning this year’s Cannes Agency of the Year Award,” comments Luiz Sanches, creative director at AlmapBBDO. “This year, Brazil had one of its best participations in the history of the festival. Over 50 Lions were won. This performance was 30 per cent better than in the previous year, without having significantly increased the number of submissions. In other words, the fact that AlmapBBDO was Agency of the Year at the festival not only restates its role in the Brazilian market, but shows Brazil’s creative growth and maturity as well.”

In terms of media, it remains true that as a nation Brazil still stands strongest in print; the Press Grand Prix was awarded to AlmapBBDO’s Billboard Magazine campaign and overall Brazil netted 28 Lions in the Press and Outdoor categories. In stark contrast, only one Film Lion was awarded, with a silver going to Borghierh/Lowe and Dinamo Filmes for their animated spot for Skip Detergent.

However, across the board Brazilian agencies are pointing to a sophistication in the way they are approaching and integrating media, an argument highlighted by AlmapBBDO’s Grand Prix-winning campaign. As well as producing the print campaign – which featured the faces of famous musicians created from smaller images of the artists who’d influenced them – the agency placed digital installations in bars, where users could create their own image composed of their favourite stars in real time.

The campaign also partnered with Last.fm, and users were presented with their own Billboard cover featuring their image created from the top four artists in their playlists. “In Brazil all those mass mediums are still very big in terms of results,” continues Sanches, “but it’s not enough, you have to move on. There are a lot of things to be done yet, and it’s a different way of seeing things, but I think we are in a learning process of how to do it.”

“It’s about raising the bar all the time,” agrees Sergio Valente, president and CEO of DDB Brazil. “You cannot keep doing the same thing, it’s necessary to keep growing and it’s about discovering new standards.” Over in the production world, while the creative output might not be setting the world on fire, the work levels have remained high. International work coming to the country did drop as a result of the economic crisis, but the industry has more than survived on home-grown output. As a case in point, production powerhouse O2 Filmes processed around 200 jobs in 2009 and has continued to expand its post production unit.

This self-sufficiency and stability in the local market has helped Brazil see off the economic crisis. But in creative terms, this comes as a double-edged sword, believes NEOGAMA/BBH head Alexandre Gama. “Brazil is in a strong moment economically and that is good. But what I don’t think is good is that when this happens, the industry and the clients tend to look at internal markets and focus on attending to the demands of the local consumers, and they become more conservative. At that moment I think that advertising and communication as a whole suffers in terms of ideas because you’re very insular, looking just at yourself and for yourself.”

In contrast to neighbouring Argentina, the healthy Brazilian economy has meant advertising hasn’t been forced to seek business outside its borders so much, but the frontiers do appear to be opening up. The bigger agencies are receiving more regional and global work, and over in production the talent pool is internationalising too. “The market as a whole is becoming more international,” relays Greg Jenkins, executive producer at Bossa Nova Films, “and Brazilian creatives who’ve worked abroad are returning to the country, and for the first time ever international directors are coming here.”Bossa Nova’s roster includes a selection of Argentinean, Danish and Chilean filmmakers alongside their Brazilian counterparts, while the arrival of other production companies such as Hungry Man and Paranoid reinforces the international trend.

But even bigger than this is the Brazilian marketplace’s growing attraction for international brands. The country’s C and D classes are continuing to boom and spending power is increasing, meaning consumers with Real-lined pockets are ripe for the picking. Chuck into the mix the fact that Brazil will play host to the 2014 World Cup, add in the Olympic Games in 2016 for extra measure, and the future is looking bright for Brazil.

“I think advertising is a consequence of the whole economy,” concludes DDB’s Valente, “and I think right now we’re in a wonderful moment in our country – we have less people under the poverty line, more people in education. Of course we still have a lot of questions and problems, but we are a country that is growing and advertising is a consequence of that, and I think we’re going to have six wonderful years here in Brazil.”