Category: Activity | 10th Sep 2008

"So, I've been appointed my first carers... The very proud "Board of the Ads" team, winners of the HS&P Advertising Scavenger Hunt.

The crazy guys and girls of HS&P were sent out and about round Soho - in some bizarre fancy dress, I might add - in teams with a list of tasks to complete.

There were four teams and they had to give themselves team names and dress accordingly, all with the theme of advertising. And goodness, did they take it seriously when they found out there were points at stake for best dressed!

One team called themselves "Advertise or Die" and came dressed as characters from adverts, such as the Marlborough Man, the Milk Tray Man (with a full box of chocolates which worked wonders with the ladies later in the evening!) and a pint of Guinness.

Another team was named "Fun, Fame and Fortune", a nod to one of HS&P's mottos, and so came dressed as a selection of our clients - a B&Q builder, Ted (the) Baker and a top hat & tailed Camelot covered in £20 notes (not real ones unfortunately!) and lottery tickets, to name a couple.

The third team was called "Colin" and came dressed as The Lost Boys from Peter Pan. No-one can work out how any of this relates to advertising, but hey, they looked great!

Finally, and the winners of the best dressed, were the fourth team "Board of the Ads" - the team were all dressed in black, with huge billboard ads attached like masks, which their faces were sticking through and were painted to match the advert. They had an advert for Laser Eye Surgery, an unknown Chinese product, (T)Esso petrol, bubblegum, red wine and transgender modification surgery.

They all certainly attracted some attention! It particularly raised eyebrows in some of the more up-market venues they were sent to - the Sanderson for instance didn't let a single team inside for long enough to have a drink!

And some of the tasks were as crazy as the people doing them...

In amongst running from venue to venue they had to do things such as photograph their whole team with a Honda, find and photograph a man named "Ted" (i.e. Ted Baker client), find and photograph a person with dimples (in honour of their work on the whisky product for Diageo), find and photograph the best look-a-like of the big chief, Justin, and the funniest of all was having to stand outside a rival agency and sing the song from one of the adverts that agency had produced. The re-enactment of the Drench "Rhythm is a dancer" advert outside CHI is definitely in danger of becoming a You Tube classic!

Phew... I'm getting tired just thinking about it. I'm quite glad I got to stay nice and snug in my presentation box while they were all running around - it sounds like pretty hard work.

You have to keep your wits about you when you're with these people though, as there was some sneaky business going on - one team even tried to hold a member of the opposition hostage at one point!

They were rewarded for their immense efforts with a generous bar tab at the final destination - Nordic Bar - which even stretched to providing them with plates of chips and hotdogs - served the traditional Scandinavian way with mashed potato in the rolls with the sausages!

All in all, it sounds like a fantastic time was had by all, and there were definitely some rather sore heads on shoulders when I was presented to the winners the following day.

I'm definitely looking forward to joining these guys on their next adventure... I wonder what it will be."

Author: Golden gnome

At HS&P, we think we're different. We're a third planners, a third creatives and a third client service teams.

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