Never Be Honest With Your Colleagues

This post contains lethal doses of sarcasm if read irresponsibly.

@grapejuiceboys

“Alright, team,” the creative director bellows with a steadfast urgency. “McDonald’s is worried about Wendy’s making moves with their new chicken sandwich, so they want us to craft a new brand voice.”

Brainstorms are typically an excuse to crack open a few beers and casually trash our clients while we spitball ideas that their corporate legal team will eventually reject or water down until it’s a pale facsimile of its former, more vibrant iteration.

But this meeting of the minds feels different, more purposeful. McDonald’s is the brand leader in the fast-food game, and they’ve crafted a wholesome persona meant to be warm and inviting to encourage family meals. This is a deceptive aspirational narrative that detached C-suiters convince themselves is de facto reality, because it never overlaps with the more squalid ambiance of its actual franchises.

An hour passes with a dozen or so creatives throwing darts at anything that could shake up a stagnating brand. Be more snarky on Twitter! Kill Wendy’s with kindness! Bring back classic Happy Meal toys! Make a Big Mac bitcoin!

Eventually, the war room collectively sighs and shrugs with the unified realization that any mildly zany campaign idea will probably fall outside of the guardrails of their brand guidelines and risk tolerance. We eventually settle on something corny and saccharine—you know, wholesome. The sting of eventual defeat inspires some passive insults about the client. These are typically reserved for private Teams messages, but constant frustration has a tendency of loosening people’s inhibitions.

An hour of pointless hand-wringing has aroused a saucy feeling within me, and I decide to speak up in a half-ironic manner: “Who still buys this wholesome, family-friendly image? Let’s be real. McDonald’s is for late-night drunk munchies, hangover breakfasts, and their floors are basically urinals for homeless crackheads. Why not embrace it and have some fun?”

The room falls silent and awkward, as if I performed a sacrilegious violation of some unspoken code.

“Sam, they’re our top-paying client! Why would you say that??”

---