Cannes Lions attract the best talents in advertising and marketing every year. It can be criticized as an ostentatious gathering. However, it also celebrates great craft and creativity. There is much to gain by participating in a gathering of the world’s best. These participants return deeply inspired.
One can meet one’s heroes here. The proceedings here influence you subconsciously. It is of course, expensive to get there or your work to compete there. At the same time, winning a Lion does not assure you guaranteed clients. However, it creates buzz which ultimately bring you clients. Here you win alongside the world’s best. They lend you a certain value by mere association. It affects your standards of creativity. It tells upon your pricing. Even while not winning, you get an urge to compete with the great work. You wish you could have thought of it. It generates a healthy spirit of competition.
Are these Lions relevant every year? These days there is excessive importance of tech and media. Creativity has taken a backseat. Most winning entries are centered on purpose. However, despite its shortcomings, there is nothing else except Cannes week.
Cannes has added categories like humour this year (2024). Humour is also seeping in purpose driven categories such as health and wellness.
Since Cannes is a celebration of ideas, there are no losers there. Both the winners and losers have something to take away from the festival.
India shines at Cannes over the past few years. Indian creativity is celebrated across the world.
India (2024) bags 18 metals at the end of this year’s five-day festival. In 2015, the Indian performance was not good, and India had picked 15 metals. Cannes distributes Gold, Silver and Bronze Lions to outstanding works in various categories. In 2020-21, India won 22 metals, 2022 it was 47, 2023 it won 24 and 2015 it won only 13. In 2015, they introduced a new category, Glass Lions, and the redeeming feature is a Grand Prix that year.
The two prerequisites for the awards are inventiveness and bravery.