Alphée Lamothe and Gabriel Lafond won gold in the media category at the Canadian Young Lions Competitions. This means they were sent to France to compete globally at the Cannes Lions Festival of Creativity. From browsing the Cannes Lions case studies to flexing their creative muscles – they discuss the highlights of the festival and the challenges of creating work for an international audience.
Give us a quick intro – who you are, where you work, and what you do.
AL: Hi, my name is Alphée Lamothe! I work at Cossette Media as a Media Supervisor.
GL: Hello! My name is Gabriel Lafond and I also work at Cossette Media as a Media Supervisor.
What would you say to someone who was on the fence about competing in Young Lions 2024?
AL: The Young Lions Competitions are a great environment and opportunity to think outside the box and play with your creativity outside of your day-to-day. It’s an opportunity to get inspired and build an entire strategy from top to bottom instead of focusing only on your expertise: trying new things, deep-diving into relevant subjects, incorporating innovation, etc. It is also a great bonding experience with your colleagues as you spend time together preparing for the competition in addition to a full 24 hours of collaborative work!
GL: The Young Lions Competitions are such a great way to have a “non-job related” experience with your coworkers. In the two years I participated, I had the chance to create deeper connections with colleagues that I can now call friends. It’s also a great way to test yourself on a brief that doesn’t have any repercussions in the end. You can let your minds go in every direction and enjoy the creative challenge of a 24-hour competition.
Tell us about the global competitions, how did the experience compare to the Canadian qualifiers?
AL: The goals are the same and the process is relatively similar. However, the global competitions requires a slightly different strategy. You’re not focusing on specific media formats or platforms as much as trying to find one big, bold idea. The vision also had to stay global so we had to rethink our approach to solving the problem.
GL: The process is really similar. You have 24 hours to answer the brief and the morning after your submission, you have a 5-minute pitch in front of a small jury formed by media specialists from all around the world. I would say there’s one big difference – you have to adapt to an international brief. You have to get rid of your Canadian media stereotypes and think internationally. You can’t rely on companies, partners or publishers that aren’t known worldwide and you can’t assume that everybody uses TikTok or Instagram.
What was your most rewarding moment when competing globally?
AL: Honestly, we felt very blessed just to be there. Being in the middle of the action during one of the biggest Creativity Festivals in the world is unreal. To be able to see what the other teams came up with was pretty impressive too.
GL: I couldn’t agree more with Alphée. Having the opportunity to represent Canada at an international event really made us proud. It’s clearly a once-in-a-lifetime experience that we had the chance to live back in Cannes, and we’re coming back full of ideas and ambitions to push our work further and maybe one day be nominated for a Cannes Lion.
Other than the competitions, break down some of your most exciting experiences at the festival.
AL: My number one experience would have to be walking through this year’s case submissions. They are all displayed in the conference center basement. The room has a museum feel with the infinite number of rows of cases displayed. They are identified by category and as the week goes by, they add mentions of the winning case directly on the boards. We walked through the rows multiple times during the week and in the end, spent a couple of hours looking at them. It is impressive to see the work being done across the globe – Definitely sparked ideas and conversations throughout the week!
GL: What I enjoyed the most besides the competition was connecting with people from all around the world and listening to the individual challenges in their part of the world. We had the chance to listen to a large number of panels in which CMOs from various industries discussed their story, their recent achievements but also their vision for the future of advertising.
How has your experience at Cannes Lions influenced your approach to work back in Canada?
AL: My biggest takeaway from this experience is that you do not need a big budget to create incredible campaigns. A lot of the cases showcase amazing ideas done with little to no budget. You just need to go for it and try new bold things and the consumers often end up loving it!
GL: The key takeaway for me is clearly the creative process behind every campaign. We’ve all been in situations where we feel we don’t have time to be creative and just remove the creative thinking process behind a plan. But looking at all the cases that were in Cannes, it clearly made me realize that no matter when the deadline is or how much time you have to work on your strategy, there’s always a little place for creativity and maybe that’s what will make your media campaign unforgettable.
