The more I hear about them, the more I think that Cadbury Schweppes Beverages really gets it.
They had a huge viral win with the Dr Pepper Cherry Chocolate Rain video; so far the video has had over a million and a half views and it only cost $200,000. Not to mention how the video positively positioned the Dr Pepper trademark.
A reader comments that Cherry Chocolate Rain is not the only bargain the Cadbury has gotten lately.
Apparently, the very slick new website by VML for Snapple was created for the I-bought-it-on-eBay cost of $250,000.
At least, that is what it cost Cadbury:
“This website costs over a million to produce, but only costs Cadbury $250,000. Why the overage the company had to eat? EGOS, EGOS, EGOS. . . creative egos swell at VML and they wrote a check that the developers couldn’t cash. The website you see is held together with spit and wire – the developers did a good job making it work. The creative director (Tony Sneethen) cost the company hundreds of thousands of dollars. It was a fiasco of epic status at VML.”
I am stupefied that VML would have proposed a site like Snapple’s with a budget of $250,000. And the fact that Cadbury was able to hold their feet to the fire and make them actually create what they pitched…well, that gets you a site this good that cheap.
I usually fall on the agency’s side of the production cost argument – I think that clients need to understand that the things they are asking for, especially last-minute changes, have a cost associated with them. Clients must be willing to adjust their budget if they adjust the scope of a project.
However, I have also been in the room when agencies have promised the world on a shoe-string budget to win the job (or because they don’t realize just how much work will go into the project – which is Bozo the Clown’s usual m.o. on digital), and then furiously backpedal when it comes time to pay the piper.
If you pitch it, you have to be able to execute it.
If you lose money executing something you’ve promised, well, you get called out on an industry blog (among other things).
Good job, VML. You get this upside-down EFFIE for ineffectiveness in managing a budget:
