The production pitch process is broken
The way in which creative agencies appoint directors and producers to a project isn't working. And Katie Trew believes that, to fix it, we need to ditch directors' treatments, create partnerships between creatives and creators, and embed agency teams into the process.
Creative agencies of the world – it’s time we took a good long look at how we engage our production suppliers and directors, and ask ourselves: Is it really working for us?
The answer will probably be no, because the pitch process needs a serious overhaul. The way in which creative agencies appoint directors and production suppliers hasn’t really changed since the days of Don Draper, while the rest of the industry is barely recognisable from that era. There has got to be a better way, one that would save us time and money that we could re-invest into creating better work for clients.
“Directors’ treatments are not the best way of deciding who’s best for a project”
Directors’ treatments need to go
Directors treatments are not the best way of deciding who’s best for a project. They’re just not. Being the best ‘treatment builder’ does not necessarily make you the best director for the project.
Directors who can afford it often outsource the production of their biblical treatments: thick, glossy documents that no one gives due respect or time to. I’m sorry – but it’s true.
I am still yet to see a treatment from a director that absolutely, wholeheartedly nailed it 100%. The reason? Directors are playing a guessing game.
It’s a guessing game
Directors are trying to decipher what will win them the job, rather than exploring how powerful and effective the idea could become.
When creatives brief out a script or a kernel of an idea to a range of directors, it’s often just that – a seedling that needs water, sun and love. It’s an hour-long conversation. Instead of throwing those creative seeds out and seeing what comes back, the end result would be better if creatives planted the seeds themselves and guided their growth.
Consider this for a moment. What if creative agencies engaged only one, maybe two directors, and their producers, and together develop the treatment so that it was exactly what should be presented to client, both in format and content?
Instead of production companies spending their time, money and energy on competitive pitches, what if they could sit at a collaborative table with the creatives and agency producers working out the best way to make the idea as incredible as possible within the budget provided?
We need a true partnership between creatives and creators
Creatives and directors should, together, interrogate an idea in its infancy then present the final work as a united front. An agency’s time should be invested in workshopping the concept with a worthy director and producer until it’s everything it could have imagined and more. Be a part of the director’s development process and guide them on where you want them to take it.
What I am suggesting is the empowerment of creative teams and a true partnership between creative and creator. An art director should be the lens through which a director sees the job. Imagine if they were deeply embedded in the development process rather than just asked to comment on images on set.
Agency production teams need to step up to the plate
This new world relies on heads of TV and their agency producers investing time to really understand who is out there, and what they can do: knowledge beyond watching a reel. We need to have relationships with our industry partners that allow us to engage the right director and production team to develop the idea together. Or, at the very least, try to engage our dream team upfront.
I understand some business arrangements and procurement restrictions require more than one quote, so let’s agree that we naturally need to comply with these agreements when required. I’m not suggesting this is the right solution for every project or client, but I implore creative agencies to try it out and see how it feels.
At worst, creatives would spend more time with talented directors and soak up meaningful, and often lacking, production knowledge. Production companies would be saved thousands of dollars in the pitch stages, resulting in more budget funnelled towards the work itself. Talented directors would win back years of their lives that could be better spent working on projects that are going somewhere. And, of course, the big win, is that we would all spend more time collaborating on quality projects for our clients.
How about we give it a try?
Katie Trew is executive producer of content and production company King Street
A Director that is not a “creative” enough person and just tries to “decipher”? Sorry Mr Kubrick, James Cameron, Ridley Scott et al. You are past your use by date it seems.
As Billy Connolly once said, “don’t tell me how to do my job and I won’t tell you how to sweep floors”.
Or something like that.
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Interesting idea. As a producer with 15+ years experience, I’d be happy to come in for a meeting earlier in the process to discuss projects.
There’s always so many ways to approach a production. A true collaboration to explore options with the creative team, could be beneficial for both agency & production compared to us guessing on the approach we think might win the job & presenting that as “the approach”. I’d suggest start with your production EPs, they can advise on how their different directors might approach a project & their strengths.
But please remember the production team aren’t on salary, we only get paid when we’re awarded a job. If we’re in an unpaid meeting, we’re spending money to be there (literally and/or in opportunity cost).
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I do agree this needs to change. I know I spent 180 hours across over a number of reworks of a campaign that the agency only revealed at the last minute was still to go through research. That is a lazy agency producer expecting fully fleshed out budgets, treatments, schedules and all the detail that comes with that when all they probably needed was the ability to ballpark and see how viable the concept was. This shows me that there is lacking experience in production departments and the transparency wasn’t there.
A good producer should be able to tell you how viable something is before the concept goes to the client off the top of their head or with a few moments thought – at least a range. The client needs this estimation to make a call on the concept, but we don’t all need to be coming up with a fully fleshed out treatment to help agencies here.
There are a few solutions I see, even without breaking the entire model:
1. Ballpark early
2. Talk to production houses without just one director on board and begin conversations early in the job to get a feel for options and budget ranges
3. The treatment does have an impact on costs but we can all easily do a broad strokes approach without fleshing out the entire presentation in an early phase.
4. Agency producers get better at being able to ballpark the production and setting the parameters for the production team brief ahead of time
5. Use a consultant that is independent to the bidding process and get their help to ballpark and plan an approach/solution or even supplier choices to meet a budget or solve a brief
6. Don’t ask for treatments and detailed budgets if the concept isn’t 100% a goer
7. Know your budget before you brief the job in and communicate that (no open ended briefs to see how people might respond… seriously, you don’t still do that do you?)
8. Hire people who know what they’re doing
9. Tell the truth about the stage the job is at with the client – how real is it?
10. If you have an inhouse capability then stop asking for your competitors to quote on the job that they’ll never get. If you are still doing that you really have a conflict of interest despite the client signing forms that they are aware you are doing it.
Just saying…
No wonder many production houses are now starting to work directly with clients. I know for myself that many of the agencies add to the costs of the production by their cumbersome process including all this at pitch stage. I could comfortably say it adds 25% to the cost of the production house job, on top of the agency costs that add about 50% again. Not exactly the most cost efficient for the brands out there now.
That may be the bigger problem than treatment and budget time wasting.
What an odd take? Case in point. If you want Ridley Scott to Direct your commercial, & he used to Direct commercials through his company RSA (although pretty much just does TV & features now via Scott Free now as far as I’m aware) you don’t ask Ridley Scott to write you a competitive treatment. You decide he’s the guy for the job (based on the fact he’s Ridley Scott), you make him an offer & you wait for his agent to accept or not. Then you work with Scott to develop it.
What’s being proposed is already how it works at the top end, it’s the rest of us gambling a couple of grand & our weekends on compeitive pitching to maybe win a gig with a margin of 10-15%.
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Too many directors and production companies still want too much time, too much control and too much money.
All this OLD SCHOOL CRAP LIKE:
‘The client’s ‘split’ is over there’.
‘Don’t ask the director, ask his producer, who’ll ask him/her’.
The world doesn’t work like that anymore.
99% of the work clients want nowadays they want as cheap and as fast as they can get it.
That’s the world we live in.
The odd job is still big and fab – but you can’t create an industry around waiting for that job and not the stuff that pays the bills day-in, day-out.
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“So what’s your budget?”
“Errrr…we’re not sure.”
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But your theory assumes that clients/procurement don’t contractually demand 3 quotes. Which many do.
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The elephant in the room is the client, and their consultants who hover over their shoulder advising them how to make their agencies work better and more efficiently.
I’ve been in meetings where the consultants have grilled our agency to justify the cost of a $100 expense. So imagine what the consultants would do to an agency that didn’t do its due diligence and brief a project out to a full panel of directors.
If the system is broken, have a stern word with the client. Not the agency.
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The squeeze is real… unfortunately production houses have been reliant on the agencies to trickle down big brief work. It was a model that worked since the industry started.
But for the past 5 years, most agencies are holding the work, and more and more of it as time goes by, simply due to survivability. Now clients are doing it too. Being mates can only go so far in a production -> agency relationship.
But, in my anonymous opinion… production houses can adapt to do agency work, a lot better than agencies can & have adapted to do production house work.
Skip the middle man. And when you do, the creatives in agency land (including suits and planners) who want to make great work, will help and join you.
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Spot on Real World, here’s a thought. Forget Directors, Art Directors and Writers as separate roles. Integrate the roles, the majority of projects and budgets are way down on what we charged 20 years ago for the same work.
Her is a tip Mr and Mrs client, if you spend under $2million ditch your big agency and do us all a favour including yourselves.
Deal with a boutique, a writer/director and get more value on screen.
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Got to hand it to Katie, her approach works. Having just delivered a complex production, without having to do the standard 3 treatments trying to guess what the client wants makes life so much more pleasant. And the collaborative process took a lot of the risk out of the production.
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Nailed it. The economic climate has shifted considerably, and as “shake it up” has put it, everyone is feeling the squeeze. I agree that it’s far easier for production companies to adapt, & do the work that agency people do, than vice versa.
The relationship model has been broken for a while now. At best they are tenuous, extremely political, & have a very short shelf life. This is the only industry I’m aware of where high risk doesn’t equal high reward. No offence to agencies but they cause more problems than they solve. Cut them out, & deal with clients directly.
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Much to agree with here.
I’ve lost count of the number of pitches I’ve sweated over, fired into the void and either heard nothing back, got turned around in rewrites as the project morphs, or got stuck in the weeds on a vapourware preproduction to appease someones desperation/vanity. It’s a dismal way to embark on what might become a lasting creative relationship somewhere down the line but hey ho. It’s why I invoice.
Paying people to knock up treatments? I’ve got a family… and anyway I’m not that cynical…yet. Also worth noting that in the last 10 years I’ve been paid a treatment fee once.
The game is schizophrenic to its core, and except for a golden few, it’s impossible for production creatives like me to exercise any control or protect my interests. The only power you have is to say no. As a director one minute you’re a dime a dozen, not worth the courtesy of an email or a call. Next minute you’re a magician who’s going throw magic dust over the latest last minute brain-fart from the 24 year old creatives. And of course then there’s the edit…
There used to be a semblance of discipline in this work. Not so much anymore and the work suffers as a result.
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My bet is most clients dont even understand the treatments . Its like asking a mechanic to understand how to do a heart operation .
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