After 50 Years of the Bubonic Plague, Things Can Only Get Better

As every advertising person under the age of 65 knows, television is advertising and advertising is television. And since there's nobody in advertising over 43, that means everybody. So when people discover that I worked in advertising before the arrival of commercial television, the response is incredulity. If television is advertising, how can there have been advertising before there was television? Let's move on to something more interesting.

The 50th anniversary of the first commercially funded television broadcast (Thursday, 22 September 1955) has been recently and relentlessly covered: even by those rival media who long ago campaigned so energetically against it.

We've been reminded of the hostility to the 1954 Television Bill that was expressed in both Houses of Parliament. Here are a few choice comments.

'Somebody introduced smallpox, bubonic plague and the Black Death. Somebody is now minded to introduce sponsored broadcasting into this country.'

Lord Reith, founding Director General of the BBC:

'A Caliban emerging from his slimy cavern.'

Lord Hailsham:

'A planned and premeditated orgy of vulgarity.'

Lord Esher

And the Labour party committed itself to repealing the act should it win the next general election, due no later than 1956.

Those who continue to believe that nothing worthy of the phrase 'creative advertising' preceded the birth of commercial television must have been bewildered to learn that the British advertising community of 1954-55 was far from thrilled by its imminent arrival. One distinguished agency head openly opposed it, and on interesting grounds. He believed that this shameless new medium, shouldering its way uninvited into people's living rooms, would force them to recognise the ugliness of advertising in general – and thus jeopardise the entire industry, including the existing established media, and put thousands out of work. Most agencies thought commercial television likely to be no more than an experiment destined to failure. Even as they recruited a few token specialists to cope with its introduction, they were making discreet plans for future withdrawal.

Nor did it seem, for the first few years, that the doom-mongers were wrong. The early investors (the 'contractors') lost millions – and Associated Newspapers, having bled copiously, cut its holding from 40% to 10% just before the pioneer companies finally crept into profit.

All this and much more we've recently been reminded of; and can look back upon now with lofty amusement. But at least as interesting, and much less familiar, is how the advertising business saw television advertising 20 years ago, 30 years after its introduction; and luckily there's an excellent source. In 1986, Century Benham Ltd, under the auspices of The History of Advertising Trust, published British Television Advertising: the first 30 years. Much of the above is stolen from its pages.

It was edited by Brian Henry and contains a year-by-year account, 1955-85, of the development of the medium: political, geographical and financial. It also contains chapters by, among others, David Bernstein and James Garrett, which concentrate more on the development of the television commercial itself. They make fascinating reading.

The identification of advertising with television was (and to some extent, still is) a big fmcg, big agency, London-centric misconception. As early as 1967, three advertisers (Unilever, Procter & Gamble and Beecham's) between them accounted for over a quarter of ITV's total revenue. The surging supermarkets, whose spread and power matched that of ITV, began to demand a commitment to a significant television presence before allocating shelf space to any new product: surely the first instance of an advertising medium demonstrating its value well before any actual advertisements had been bought, written or run.

Outside London, and away from the big national advertisers, sanity and some sense of proportion were maintained; but the overwhelming fame of television – and television commercials – infected everybody. And the people most infected were agency creative people.

Over the last few years, it's true, even the largest agencies have belatedly recognised that other effective media exist and need to be mastered. But as recently as last year, I heard one creative director, having obediently claimed to be in thrall to ambient, buzz, online and viral, devote 90% of his presentation time to what he chose to call 'the best fucking reel in London'. He showed no print, no radio and no outdoor.

For about 40 years now, young creative people have been joining the bigger agencies with the single-minded aim of making cool telly ads; and whatever their contribution to commercials may have been, they've done little or nothing for all the other media.

In his chapter on the television commercial, written presumably in 1985, David Bernstein recounts agencies' early struggles to understand the new medium. I remember them well myself. The average art director was even more baffled than the average copywriter. Agency producers existed, though if they knew anything at all (and few did) it was to do with the mechanics of production. No producer knew anything about advertising.

Although (as we kept telling ourselves) television was a visual medium, it was also a narrative medium; and so it was that the writer prevailed over the art director and the words prevailed over the pictures. Most early commercials were explicit, repetitive, assertive and wordy. But by 1985, Bernstein noted, things had changed dramatically. 'Whereas the press copywriter had communicated by what he physically wrote, the new breed of writer realised that the commercial communicated far more than what was written. Pictures lead. Words become comments. Information moved from the right hand side of the script (audio) to the left (video). The “how” was saying as much as the “what”.'

As the concept of the brand became more widely understood, and as the range and quality of production values soared (colour, lighting, casting, music, editing, post-production wizardry), so it became apparent that the television commercial was not merely a means of communicating benefits and values but could also, of itself, become a significant contributor to that brand's personality.

All true; and by and large, good. But even in 1985, David Bernstein was voicing early concern: 'Advertising was not simply a means of highlighting the difference between brands. It became itself the difference. Where will this lead? If products are distinguished only by the advertising, then technique will overcome ideas. Production gloss and technical accomplishment can easily fool us into thinking we have an advertising idea.'

Nor, according to Bernstein, was this dangerous delusion confined to the television medium. 'Television has changed advertising. The press advertisement is less verbal. It killed a whole school of copywriting. When television became the lead medium – and the most fashionable – the art of copywriting fell into decline. The power of television is undeniable, but it can blind agency people to alternative solutions to a client problem.'

In his chapter on commercial production, also written in 1985, James Garrett raised similar concerns. 'At this time, we are struggling in the slipstream of technology's remorseless advance. We are using the new toys expensively and a little aimlessly. Creative work is being injected with electronic devices, often as a sleight-of-hand alternative to advertising purpose.'

In the course of the 20 years that have followed, the foreboding of Bernstein and Garrett seems to have been broadly justified. There are some wonderful exceptions: simple, compelling advertising ideas; great storytelling; elegant and economical direction; engaging, rewarding persuasion: exactly the kind of commercials that we'll all need to survive in the hostile new world of PVRs and all those other devilish devices.

But a depressing proportion of television commercials today seem to have abandoned the search for an advertising idea, for inspired brand positioning. Twenty years ago, agencies were found guilty of abdicating their first responsibility – the invention of relevant advertising ideas – and, instead, subcontracting production companies to provide them with some superficial, brand-irrelevant stylishness. Today, the delegation has gone yet another link down the supply chain: first from agency to production house – and now from production house to post-production facility. Commercial after commercial, in the absence of an advertising idea and in the search for some kind of spurious distinction, uses its client's money to buy what James Garrett called 'sleight-of-hand alternatives to advertising purpose'. To expose such commercials for what they are is easily done. Simply ignore the visual wizardry and the computerised creations of the otherwise impossible and just listen. The words, if there are any, will be banal beyond belief; and vast sums of money will have been devoted to disguising this truth.

From its uncertain start in 1955, the television commercial took on all existing advertising media (yes, Timmy, there were some) and proved its worth. It then enjoyed some years of dangerously unchallenged primacy: chosen thoughtlessly and often made and used indulgently. Over the next ten years, for all those reasons that need no rehearsal, the television commercial will need to prove itself all over again.

For those who love the medium, this is excellent news. Forced to return to certain timeless disciplines, its new strength will spring not from its associate membership of the celebrity culture but from a trim and muscular ability to do its job beautifully. Advertising people will welcome it back.