GoaFest Day 2 musings of Pratap Bose

GoaFest kicked off in all earnest today (April 9, 2010) and the crowds kept checking in at all the hotels from the wee hours of the morning. Getting the usual ‘bike’ was quite a hassle I was told, and some had their exasperating moments finding a two-wheeler of their choice. It was a lazy start (but that’s how Goa is supposed to be) to the proceedings with an after-lunch kick-off with Colvyn, Bhaskar and Sam doing the honours at the beach front. Bhaskar stole the show with some dance steps that would make Mithun Da starry eyed!

I drank a few beers at the Mudra shack this afternoon, which was very impressively dressed up I must say, and met up with quite a few old friends, which was refreshing. The proceedings then transferred to the dome, and considering the contents of the day before at the Business Conclave, I was a bit apprehensive.

I sat with rapt attention listening to Will Collin, Michael Constantine and Tim Mellors and lo behold, what a delight it was. The quality of the speakers and what they had to say was certainly top notch today, and going by what I saw as a full house, it certainly vindicated my observations.

I liked the phrase ‘Unsexy is the new sexy’ used by Will Collin in which he demonstrated the efficacy of that statement by way of the Boots example. His 10 steps or ways to bring about freshness in marketing was well articulated and spelt out. Naked is known for that – don’t you agree?

Michael Constantine, Global Marketing Head for Prime Focus, completely transformed the opinion of the audience in terms of how they viewed Prime Focus as an organisation and as you would expect it to be – his AVs of the work produced by Prime Focus was outstanding to say the least. It’s just such a great example of how global an Indian company can be, if it wants to.

Tim Mellors was his usual charismatic self and his examples of what has stood the test of time compared to the current work pertaining to the same brands, was certainly very insightful.

All in all, a day that certainly had better content than the previous one.

I had to rush back and have a shower before the Media Awards got underway and so gave Richard Pinder a miss. Sorry about that Richard!

The Media Abbys was a dignified yet eventful night with a few major surprises in the final results. After having won comprehensively for the last three consecutive years, it certainly wasn’t a canter in the park for Mindshare this time around.

The top honours this year, in terms of Golds won, were Lodestar and Mudra Max with three Golds each, out of a total of nine Golds awarded on the night, while Maxus ended up winning the most Silvers and Bronze metals with five each.

A total of 39 awards were given out in good measure and spirit.

The IPL cheer girls brought quite a chuckle to the usually staid audience, which was fun. The after twitter was all about how the smaller media agencies (smaller in terms of billings) are fighting that much harder and evening out the turf to make the Media Award shows far more even contested in the times to come.

The final scorecard did read as appended below:

I am sure there would be a lot of happy media heads on pillows tonight, eyeing the Media Abby on the table as they fall asleep. Congratulations to you all. Sleep well. You deserve it.

Tomorrow is another exciting day, and going by the creative shortlists, I have a sneaky feeling that we might be in for some big surprises tomorrow!

(Pratap Bose is CEO, Mudra Max, and COO, Mudra Group.)