The fall of the madmen

How advertising ate itself

Featured in

  • Published 20240206
  • ISBN: 978-1-922212-92-4
  • Extent: 204pp
  • Paperback, ePub, PDF, Kindle compatible

THE MT BUFFALO Chalet was shrouded in mist all weekend. One wag quipped it clearly had a seventy-cigarette-a-day habit. The hotel in the highlands of rural Victoria was crammed to its creaky old rafters with wags and wits that wintery weekend in 1995. It was the venue for the annual Caxton advertising awards. They were run by the newspaper industry to recognise and celebrate the best ads that had appeared in their publications that year.

Back in 1995, change, as well as cigarette smoke, was in the air. Smoking was still permitted in hotels in those days. Even in old weatherboard fire hazards. But it wasn’t mist, passive smoke or being trapped inside that so disturbed the conference. For the first time in the eighteen-year history of the Caxtons, there was a sizeable number of female delegates. Nowhere near 50 per cent, you understand, but enough to make their presence felt. They weren’t the usual overworked event organisers or the few battle-scarred older female creatives who’d learnt to match quips, drinks and fags with the blokes. They were a new crowd of ambitious younger women who had persuaded their creative directors to cough up the sizeable registration fee and invest in their career. Their presence so unsettled the blokes that there was a running ‘joke’ about lesbians for the duration of the event.

Already a subscriber? Sign in here

If you are an educator or student wishing to access content for study purposes please contact us at griffithreview@griffith.edu.au

Share article

About the author

Jane Caro

Jane Caro AM was an award-winning advertising copywriter for thirty-five years. She also taught advertising at the University of Western Sydney for seven years...

More from this edition

Nostalgia on demand

Non-fictionHow then do we approach a circumstance in which it is possible to consciously curate those memories and sense impressions, such that they become mere features of our ‘profile’? Or one where third parties, having gleaned enough data to know us better than we know ourselves, can supply those memories and impressions for us?

The kiss 

FictionThe name, when it came, sounded as if it had been uttered by somebody else. The man’s look shifted from one of mild affection to puzzlement. ‘Excuse me?’ He was still smiling, but it was a different kind of grin – the type of smile people offer a stranger who begs them for spare change.

Lost decade

Fiction I MADE A point of telling people in LA that I’d come from somewhere farther than Santa Clarita: Tempe or Little Rock. When they...

Stay up to date with the latest, news, articles and special offers from Griffith Review.