When will it ever be good enough?

I’m just gonna come out and say it, BMF’s ‘Come Down for Air’ work for Tourism Tasmania is the best tourism work in the country. Arguably some of the best in the world. And those that don’t agree with me would at the very least have to acknowledge that it’s in the discussion.

For my international readers, Tasmania is a small, cold, isolated island at the southernmost tip of Australia. Look up a map of Australia, see that little triangle right down the bottom? That’s it. And it’s probably safe to say that, for the majority of living memory, it hasn’t been at the top of many ‘mainlander’s’ destination lists. It’s not hot, it’s not tropical, it’s not full of resorts, it’s just not where a typical Australian brain has gone when thinking ‘local holiday’.

But it’s cool factor has grown immensely in recent years, spearheaded by David Walsh’s antics with MONA and DARK MOFO (which are both fucking amazing if you’ve never experienced them), a burgeoning food and drink scene, a wildly varied landscape, and the incredible work done by BMF via this campaign. I’ve been to Tassie a few times in the last 5 years, and it’s bloody great.

‘Come Down for Air’ was launched in 2019. Here’s some of the initial work.

Firstly, the line is just astounding. I’m not sure a better positioning line for Tasmania is even possible. I hope they never change it, ever. There’s so many layers to it. ‘Come down’, yes, cus you have to go down, and the inversion on ‘come up for air’. The fact that the water and swimming is a big part of Tassie. The fact that the air down there really does feel different. It’s sharp and biting and makes you feel alive. That, even though you’ve gone from a giant island to a tiny island, you suddenly have more ‘air’. That you feel strangely disconnected from the ‘real world’ when you’re there.

And then those films. What a way to bring this idea to life. In a world of clumsy, aggressive, logo-laden 6s and 15s that try to hit people in the face with a brand hammer, they J U S T B R E A T H E. The ads themselves, especially when wedged between someone screaming DOORS DOORS DOORS and whatever other loud, obnoxious ad precedes and follows it, are quite literally giving you the same breath of fresh air they’re using to sell Tassie as a place. They’re simple and restrained and respectful of the viewer. Just lovely to watch. And while remaining so genuinely true to Tasmania.

There’s always those people out there that say ‘advertising isn’t art’, but this is proof they’re wrong. Because this is poetry. It’s a love letter. I was so taken aback by the campaign when it launched, that I messaged Alex Derwin, then ECD at the agency, on the day of its release just to say how beautiful I thought the work was.

Then, over the years, they kept building on it. Determined to lean harder into what makes Tassie, Tassie. They started selling ‘The Off Season’. Winter. When Tassie gets even weirder and darker and colder and lower on the destination list.

They even took the piss out of AI in the most Tasmanian way.

For 5 years, the campaign has just been consistently great. Clever writing, beautiful photography and art direction, enviable craft, it’s everything that advertising can be when everyone involved really cares and commits to something.

But if this is everything that’s great about advertising, then this is everything that isn’t.

The Tourism Tasmania account is up for ‘open tender’. Now, for any itchy trigger fingers out there, I’m aware that this is ‘just how procurement works’. I understand that there are ‘rules’. Especially when government is involved. I’ve been around long enough to understand that this is ‘just how it is’.

That doesn’t mean it should be, though. Because, bureaucracy of procurement aside, if BMF’s work for Tourism Tasmania isn’t good enough for them to justifiably retain the account on merit - then when is what we do EVER ‘good enough’? Studies have shown it can take up to TWO YEARS for agencies to break even from the relentless nature of pitches. And when companies have procurement models that mandate re-pitching every few years, it can often be a zero sum game regardless of how hard we work and how much success we bring. If one of the greatest campaigns in the country is casually thrown up for open tender ‘just because’, what message does that really send?

I want to make it clear that this is about process, more so than people. I doubt the people involved on the client-side are in great support of this. They deserve a huge amount of credit for backing this work. I’ve had many apologetic meetings with clients, new and old, about ‘procurement’ over the years. It’s a process thing. But, at the end of the day, the impact on the lives and futures of agency people who get tangled in ‘the procurement process’ is immense, regardless.

The advertising industry as we know it is falling apart. We can phrase it as ‘evolving’ and ‘changing’, but deep down we all know that we are in the midst of a collapse. Famous names and acronyms are vanishing from the face of the Earth, once giant entities condensed to a shadow of their former selves, every week we’re all fielding calls from friends who’ve been made redundant. We’re under siege. And there’s a lot of negative rhetoric out there about how it’s ‘the agency model’ that is failing. And how it’s we who need to change, and adapt, and ‘do more with less’.

But, here’s the thing. There is no ‘agency model’ in isolation unto itself. The agency model does not exist in a vacuum. Because agencies do not exist without clients, there is no model without the enduring agency-client relationship. And as we go through this period of evolution and re-invention, which will undoubtedly include a lot of pain, a new model will inevitably emerge and with it - Opportunity. Possibility. The chance to build something better.

And in a moment like this, I think it’s fair to shift the lens away from ‘the failing agency model’, and on to companies/entities and their procurement models and how they treat the agencies they partner with. When you can see the blood, the sweat, the tears, the love, the care, and the craft, in the work your agency is doing for you, as is abundantly evident in the work for Tourism Tasmania, is it really beneficial to anyone involved to force them to sing for their supper, again, and most likely for free? Is that the hallmark of a mutually beneficial, commercially rewarding relationship? Is this the best we can collectively do?

I think we can do better. It’s not ‘the agency model’ that is broken and needs repairing, it’s everything. It’s the agency-client relationship, and yes, there’s a lot of shit that agencies need to do better moving forward, but pitching and procurement is the big opportunity for brands that engage agencies to build a better world for all of us.

BMF should not have to pitch for this. No one should even entertain this for a second. We’d love to work on this account, but we won’t be going anywhere near it. And they won’t lose the account, everyone knows that. But the fact there’s even a press release, and a conversation, and this post I’m writing, and heaven forbid some people foolishly working on a proposal right now, is bad enough.

It just isn’t right. And collectively as advertising and marketing professionals, on agency and client side, we should all look at this and consider how we can do better moving forward.

Because, in the end, our successes and failures all are intertwined. We’re all in the same boat. So, let’s build a better one together.