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How Gruen makes The Pitch

"We don't make this show for the advertising industry," says Gruen host Wil Anderson. "It's always the biggest misconception about our show."

The Pitch is one of Gruen‘s most popular segments, in which advertising agencies ar tasked with making a convincing ad for diametrically opposed briefs.

Share everything on social media? Share nothing? Embrace Halloween or abolish it entirely?

Winning the segment is considered noteworthy amongst ad agencies, but as host and producer Wil Anderson explains, not all agencies are interested in participating.

“We’ve always had trouble getting big agencies involved, because they don’t want to lose to a small agency. Oten we have really good, regular people who love doing it because for them, it’s a point of pride, and they’ve got work out of it. But it’s definitely a negotiation back and forth and it survives absolutely on goodwill from the agencies,” he tells TV Tonight.

“We’re the ABC as you well know, which means we have a small budget, but they essentially to do The Pitch pulling in a series of favours from pre-existing contacts.”

Agencies are given around 6 weeks to complete their Pitch, and there is a behind-the-scenes dialogue with producers about which argument they will defend.

‘Trying to come up with a topic that’s original and interesting is the hardest part”

“After 14 years, trying to come up with a topic that’s original and interesting is the hardest part, in a way. They get a couple of weeks to then put together their pitches. We normally ask for three (on paper) from each agency. The reason is, obviously so that we can have a bit of a pick,” said Anderson.

“Often that is less about us choose the one that we love the most. Generally, we’re very happy to go with the idea that they’re passionate about, but obviously we’re trying to look at a segment that isn’t boring. If two ideas are similar, we tend to try to pick one from each that is a little bit different.

“Then they, essentially without any input from us at all, make the ad.”

If Gruen sometimes upsets the industry, Anderson isn’t fazed.

“We don’t make this show for the advertising industry. The joke was always ‘You could offer me a million dollars, and I probably couldn’t name three advertising agencies in Australia.’ And that’s probably still true,” he insists.

“Anytime anyone ever talks about the industry itself, we edit it out of the show. We don’t give a shit about the advertising industry. Our show is about giving people the tools to understand marketing, communications and advertising. It’s always the biggest misconception about our show.

“That was a bit Mumbrella”

“It’s the reason that I don’t speak at advertising events. It’s the reason that I won’t speak as an advertising person and the reason that I won’t do any of their Christmas parties. They’ve all stopped asking now but of course you can imagine 10-12 years ago….

“As our touch point, we always go, ‘That was a bit Mumbrella,’ therefore it won’t go in the show. That’s the Mumbrella world and that’s fine. They can argue all they want over at AdNews or whatever, that’s not my business.”

Gruen airs 8pm Wednesdays on ABC.

5 Responses

  1. The most notworthy one I can recall was a few years back when they had to pitch in favour of euthanasia. The winning entry was considered impressive enough for the agency to do a real ad for one of the pro-euthanasia groups.

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