From Creative to Creator… Is Cannes Lions Entering a New Experience Era

This June Cannes Lions will see rosé sipped along the Croisette during what will be its 70th year and 71st festival, welcoming advertisers and creative communicators from around the world. Over those 70 years, the festival has changed significantly, even in the mere 12 or so years I have been working at it. 

Inspired by the Film Festival, Lions was conceived by a group of cinema-screen advertisers and has had a permanent home in Cannes since 1984.

In its first years, the “festival” was more of a pure-play awards ceremony targeted at film and TV advertisers. The awards celebrated the best in creativity in adverts, which they classed as mini films in their own right and wanted a space to celebrate them outside of the iconic film festival. 

In the ‘90s we saw the shift from awards ceremony to educational festival, with seminars and workshops being added to help up-and-coming advertisers navigate the changing industry, seeking inspiration and advice from peers. This was the first taster of the Lions to come – the awards ceremony was still the cornerstone of the week, but organisers saw the potential to use the time to educate and entertain the industry while they were all conveniently gathered.

It was the ‘00s that saw the biggest step change - the change in name from The Cannes Lions International Advertising Festival to the Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity, moved the festival away from pure-play “adland” and opened up the doors for marketeers from a wide range of sectors to use the festival as a space to see the best in brand creativity.  

This paved the way for the festival as we know it now. When I first started activating at Lions, the brand activations sat cosily alongside the awards festival. Marketeers and advertisers were there in their 100s, and brands saw this as an opportunity to promote their platform as the optimal choice for marketing plans and adverts to shine on.

The awards however were still very much the main meal and the brand activations were the rosé side order spicing things up.

Fast forward a few years and to me it feels like Lions has split into three camps – those that are there for the awards, those that are there to make huge marketing and advertising deals, and those that are there to experience the brand activations that have escalated over the years. Some are there to do all three, however I would argue that the brand activations along the Croisette, around the port and up in Super Cannes have started to somewhat overshadow the awards, with press articles and column inches focused on how and where brands show up year on year. They are no longer the side order, for some they are the main event.

I have seen some incredible activations in my time – who can remember Snapchat’s Ferris Wheel (that caused quite a stir) or Vice’s party at Musee de la Castre? Back when I started activating in Cannes it was more traditional tech brands that dominated the Croisette with Microsoft, Google, Yahoo and Amazon taking prime spots

As Lions has developed, the entertainment industry crept in with Spotify, Live Nation and iHeart putting on some of the most talked about music nights in town with Lady Gaga, Dua Lipa and Sting being mentioned without hesitation and the questions always being – who will be performing this year? Finally, the social scene blew up with Pinterest, Snapchat, META, TikTok and most recently Netflix, creating spaces centred around play and experimentation. 

The brands fight for marketeer and advertiser attention - they entertain them in their brand worlds making big buck meetings that could change the course of their financial year. A lot of brand spaces are private however, some are open to the “general public” allowing anyone that happens to be in Cannes at that time to access the space, get to know the power of the brand and share their experience far and wide. Most notably Snapchat has been doing this for years with Pinterest following in their footsteps – the focus is their captivating activation space with meeting areas hidden from public view - blink and you’d miss them. 

A walk down the Croisette and you wouldn’t be judged in thinking you’d stumbled into Cannes’ answer to Coachella…. far down on the end, ‘oh that’s the Palais, there’s some awards festival going on...’

In a recent press release, Cannes Lions CEO Simon Cook announced a new creator part to the festival. He pointed to the rapid growth of the creator economy as a “crucial” factor influencing the festival’s new investment. The release references Goldman Sachs research that estimated the creator economy was a $250 billion industry in 2023, projected to nearly double by 2027. 

Now, creators at Cannes are no new thing - Influential, Whalar, Influencer and creator-centric brands such as TikTok and META have been attending and activating at Cannes as far back as 2016. But many of these brands are expanding their presence this year with some even taking over prime beach real estate. The creator economy is now fundamental to the marketing and advertising economy, and nothing says this more than the fact Lions has closed its Mobile Lions category citing that mobile marketing is now well and truly integrated into all forms of marketing and therefore cannot stand alone. 

So, what does this acknowledgement of Creators at Cannes mean?

I don’t get surprised anymore when I see a new brand decide to activate in Cannes – the access to the top marketeers, advertisers and creatives in the industry must be a hard draw to turn down. For me, with creators being encouraged to come to town I wouldn’t be surprised if we see lifestyle brands showing up and designing content-worthy spaces for them to share with their millions of followers. This could be F&B brands, fashion brands, maybe even beauty brands - cue a Hotel du Cap Gucci takeover or an Aperol beach pop-up.

Cannes is the centre for creativity whether that is through the cornerstone of the awards or the impressiveness of the brand activations – the addition of creators will just put more emphasis on creating spaces that put creativity, participation and play first… business second.

The Festival of Creativity is just that – it’s a space for the world’s best creatives to come together, share ideas, explore new tools and celebrate together. We know that brand resonance is built through memory making and the best way to do that is through participation and the stimulation of joy. Brands that show up need to embrace these factors, focusing on world-building and entertainment – and maybe win a few awards and do some million-dollar deals whilst they’re at it!

Party in the front, business in the back. Let’s see if I’m right…