Fear Kills 99.9999% of Great Ideas. So Did a Sea Otter, Once.

Little Black Book is the official media partner of the Dead Ad Society, the hungryman-founded award show that resurrects killed ideas.

Launched in 2024, this revival of hibernating concepts sees entered scripts being performed live by an improv group at the awards show. This year it will take place on September 18th at The Mint in Los Angeles after kicking off in New York City last year. A panel of judges crowns a winner, which is then brought to life by hungryman and a collection of companies – including Work Editorial, Sonic Union, ARC, Synapse and the Screen Actors Guild – that support the show with funding, time and resources. Last year's winning script was recently launched as a finished production for KUL MOCKS, a non-alcoholic beverage brand.

“We called it an anti-award show,” says Caleb Dewart, managing partner of hungryman. “It’s supposed to be wild. The scripts were performed live - a glorified table read. It was messy, imperfect, and that was the point. That’s the heart of it.”

Entries for this year’s show are open until August 15th, 2025 at 4pm PDT.

Little Black Book is catching up with this year’s jurors for honest conversations about the ideas that got away – the ones that died, came back, and the ones that stayed dead.

After kicking the series off with Highdive’s Mark Gross, up today is Guto Araki, founder and CEO of Biite.

LBB> Let's start with the obvious question: Is there an idea you’re still emotionally attached to?

Guto> Several, but one specifically, recently for Super Bowl 2024: Farfetch. They are a luxury fashion ecommerce, so we pitched and sold the idea of using the existing phenomena around smash and grab (where people ransack luxury stores and run away) to create a film where all sorts of people and celebrities were smashing store windows and stealing stuff, all to resolve with someone just smashing the BUY button on the app. The script got the attention of insanely famous directors that usually don't shoot commercials. We got incredible treatments, celebrities locked, and then… Farfetch was acquired by a company days before the pre-pro. And the rest is NOT history.

LBB> What did the death of it teach you about the business? Or about yourself?

Guto> It makes me think about Mike Tyson's words: “Everyone has a plan until they get punched in the mouth.” I think optimism is essential for creatives to get into the industry, and pessimism is essential for them to stay in it. The more pessimistic you are, the easier it is to manage expectations. After a few decades in the industry you either develop a thick komodo dragon skin so that nothing can hurt your feelings, or you just became a sociopath with no feelings at all.

LBB> What do you look for in a dead ad that makes you say, ‘This deserves to live’?

Guto> When it’s not prohibitively expensive, and there’s no risk of backlash, ideas need to be defibrillated. The better ideas are the ones with asymmetric upside/downside ratio.

LBB> How are you feeling about judging scripts in real time, in front of a live audience?

Guto> I’m feeling very powerful. Like Jesus kinda. “Hey, you should be resurrected! Yea… not you. You should rot."

LBB> How will you approach judging a script that’s being performed live? Do you think the crowd will sway you?

Guto> The crowd is the real-time funny-metre of reality. They will for sure sway me. Make no mistake, deep inside I’m a very insecure man.

LBB> Dead Ad Society is part award show, part séance. What’s your mindset heading into the room?

Guto> This is a calling. I feel responsible for solving traumas from talented creatives and for drinking with them after.

LBB> What’s the most ridiculous reason an idea of yours was killed?

Guto> The reason ideas die is ALWAYS someone’s fear. 99.9999% of the time is fear of backlash or not hitting the KPIs. But there was one time that it was fear of sea otters. The client was terrified of sea otters.

LBB> What’s your theory on why great ideas often don’t survive the process?

Guto> The amount of overthinking is directly proportional to the media buy. That’s why some Super Bowl commercials are meh. The more stake holders, the bigger the chance of dying.

LBB> Outside of this award show, have you ever seen a killed idea come back to life and succeed later?

Guto> Yes. The Better Ruins Everything campaign for Hulu was first presented to Taco Bell, and they killed it. Turned out to be an award-winning campaign a couple of years later.

LBB> Have you ever been the one to kill an idea - and regretted it?

Guto> Oh, I kill good ideas all the time. Do I regret it? I guess we’ll never know… they were never made.

LBB> If you had to hold a funeral for a dead idea, what song would play?

Guto> KC & The Sunshine Band - ‘Please Don't Go’ (1979).