BREAKING: The One on How ScanAd is Just About to Change the Face of Advertising in Uganda

The big story coming out of ScanAd Uganda at the end of last week was their ECD—famously infamous for hiring his wife as deputy CD and, more damagingly, singlehandedly overseeing Airtel’s descent into mediocrity on the back of this debacle treacherously bordering on an international incident—being sent behind the sun. As I write this post, word is already seeping through the grapevine and I can see a plethora of Facebook posts in the tenor of... 

Things came to a head when ‘ScamAd’ lost yet another big client last week (apparently they have been divesting of clients at a rate directly proportional to Moringa Ogilvy/TBH’s) and the ECD was kindly advised to take a pay cut for his stellar role in the affair; understandable because he has supervised the worst ever period in the entire history of the ScamAd franchise – almost all their clients are either bitterly complaining or altogether packing their PowerPoints and heading for the exit, completely frustrated by plummeting creative standards and appalling delays in delivery of work (one client, a CEO, confirmed that in view of ScamAd’s “pathetic” standards in Creative and Account Management, the retainer contract has turned into a wild goose chase and henceforth intends to implement a per-project engagement which, sadly, is where all clients are seemingly headed with agencies as the cross of atrocious creative standards the industry is currently bearing comes to bear; bad news for any agency looking to retainers to stabilise the business and for income projection. So you can all start kissing those Jeeps goodbye right now). When he failed to bite the carrot dangled in front of him in the form of a forced pay cut, he was asked to leave his resignation letter at the reception on his way out. Accompanying him in exiting stage left is his erstwhile account handler on Airtel who has opted to have a go at the other side of the boardroom table and is joining Vodacom.

What is most unusual about this bizarre episode is that this particular ECD is a prolific award winner – a cursory glance at his shimmering résumé is enough to launch one into a tailspin. But pray tell, why is not this prowess translating to ‘ordinary’ day-to-day jobs, ergo client satisfaction and retention? It is mindboggling to witness such an ‘elite’ Creative leaving a winding trail of seething and visibly disgruntled clients in his wake, ostensibly on account of “pathetic creative standards” while he heads ‘The Most Awarded Agency’ at the 2014 Loeries, winning an unprecedented 11 metals – a first in the history of Ugandan advertising. It has not escaped notice that Airtel’s last two 360° campaigns were executed under the auspices of Blu Flamingo—arguably Uganda’s leading digital agency—a crippling indictment on ScamAd’s lassitude and sheer inability to innovate or even marginally service that high profile account. And in light of recent revelations, who can blame Airtel?

One of many Juvenile concepts from
the infantile mind of one 'Executive'
Creative Director in Uganda.

Germane to the present inquiry is yet another such charlatan, a captain of the industry (read ‘Executive’ Creative Director) who has also made a career out of peddling his suspiciously overly impressive CV dripping with awards you’ve never even heard of (Chairman's Award, The Travel Award, Kensta Award, Effee Award) and bursting at the seams with claims of working on accounts one only sees in dreams. But a perfunctory Google search will never bring up his name in any context whatsoever, at least not in the first three pages, and when it finally does come up, links to a LinkedIn profile where, again, those exceptional awards are regurgitated. Now run a secondary Google search on those awards and the years they were apparently bestowed and they mysteriously appear under the name of world reknown Creative Director John Messum. It is not completely surprising then that left to his own devices, the best one will ever get out this swindler are awfully designed juvenile concepts far removed from any Louskacek Award and in infantile idiom for good measure. I once asked him his specialty (“Are you a writer or an Art Director?”) and he famously retorted—in a droll Scouse drawl—with, “A bit of both.” With the evidence available, it is clear that he is neither. The Ugandan advertising industry is asphyxiating under the weight of such quacks.

Another example from the juvenile ECD.

That then is how ScanAd Uganda screwed the pooch. Which only serves to close the circle on one of my pet subjects and one the industry must now urgently grapple with, a subject I have analysed at length here and also here.