Jun 26 2007 | Events

OpenAd launches annual event for young creatives.

OpenAd.net, in conjunction with trade charity NABS and the headhunter LIZ H, has launched a new training scheme for the UK’s youngest creatives.    
The annual scheme will offer advertising graduates much needed advice on working in the industry today and will run alongside each of our existing programmes of support for young creatives.

The inaugural day-long event on June 14 was hosted by AMV BBDO and included a creative brief set by trendy boardwear company, Freespirit.

It was attended by an invited audience of graduates from the UK’s top creative universities including Buckinghamshire Chilterns University College, West Herts College, Manchester Metropolitan Univeristy and University College Falmouth.

The day included a talk from AMV’s executive creative director, Paul Brazier, followed by a presentation on the ‘Think!’ campaign for the Department for Transport by the agency’s account planner Claire Hutchinson. Its digital director Alistair Beattie then spoke about the new media revolution while junior creative team, Jez Tribe and Prabs Wignarajah, led a lively question and answer session about the highs and lows of making it as a creative.

Creative teams fresh out of the University College Falmouth, Buckinghamshire Chilterns University College and West Herts College produced the best ideas in response to the Freespirit brief, the UK’s biggest supplier of boardwear brands on the high-street. The winning idea came from Tom Green and Laurence Collings, University College Falmouth. Sarah Cunningham and Stacey Buxton, Buckinghamshire Chilterns University College and Sian Morris, Chris Spencer and Nicola Dale, West Herts College, produced the runner-up ideas.

The teams were rewarded with goodies to help them on their way to producing a great portfolio; the prizes included the best selling book by Paul Arden – ‘It's Not How Good You Are, Its How Good You Want to Be’, layout pads and marker pens, plus a bottle of champagne for the winners to celebrate the day they get that first job.

The graduates also heard how we, NABS and LIZ H could help them in the future.
Our current schemes include regular ‘mentoring’ evenings for young creatives which give them a chance to network with senior creatives and have their books critiqued by names such as Mick Devito founder of Butterfield Day Devito Hockney and Peter Harold, art director, most recently at Banc.

We also intend to hold a similar event next year and will be looking for new sponsors and hosts to give students access to the broadest experiences.

Jo Smith, OpenAd.net UK general manager, said: “We are thrilled that the launch of this event for young creatives was amazingly successful. It was an inspirational day and we are delighted that AMV BBDO and Freespirit joined us and offered such great support.”
 
The event also marked the official launch of a guidebook offering creatives advice on getting a job in advertising.  Co-written by NABS, LIZ H and OpenAd, ‘Goodbye Uni…Hello Job’ was handed out to attendees on the day and is available free of charge from the OpenAd.net home page at http://old.openad.net/xyz673ijkl09932trplhlrt/GraduateBooklet/StudentGuideV5.pdf.

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