Fighting the Good Fight

For the past several weeks, things have been a storm of overtime at The Salt Mines, particularly because of a product pitch. FYI, pitches are held when a client/company needs get a new ad agency to do the advertising for their product. Agencies are selected and butt heads, pitching their stuff to win the account (in much the same way that lawyers battle in court). It usually involves hours and hours of brainstorming, pouring over research and the inevitable overnight stays at the office to produce the winning materials that will impress the clients enough to award the disputed account.

This particular pitch has been incredibly fierce... we were initially in the running with at least five other agencies. After the first round of presentations was over, the field was narrowed down to TWO; Us and one of Manila's leading ad agencies today.

With not much time and quite a bit of pressure, the crew threw stuff into the breach to win round 2. Somehow, someway, we went into the second presentation confident in our position and our materials.

It was a weekend before we would be told the results... There was going to be a ROUND THREE.

That's what's been keeping us all busy this week, as we made one last big push to make our mark. It's also where everything seemed bleakest, when we reached a crossroads where, to quote a line from Harry Potter, we had a choice between doing something that was 'right', or doing something that was easy.

In the end though, we all went with what we felt was right and steeled ourselves. Win or lose, we were going down swinging.

Just some time ago, I was informed that, unfortunately, we didn't get the account.

HOWEVER, apparently the final fight was pretty close to the very end, and we apparently impressed the clients enough that they awarded us a different account.

So, somehow, after all was said and done, we fought and lost but kinda won too. A hard-fought loss that ended with a little victory. But then again, maybe we had already won the night before.

It's these kinds of things that make advertising such a weird and colorful place. And why, in a strange way, that I know I'm in the right field of work.

Time to get some rest now. Life goes on at Salt Mines tomorrow.