Creativebrief founder Tom Holmes and Managing Director, Charlie Carpenter, were delighted to support the ‘Diversity in Advertising’ launch event at the IPA on November 13^th 2012.

Great Britain is getting increasingly diverse, to the point that by 2051 England and Wales will be as diverse as London is now. Nearly 16% of the UK population is from an ethnic minority background.

Advertising, as an industry all about connecting with consumers, needs a workforce that understands and reflects the diversity of the nation. It needs to do this for moral reasons, but also so that advertising continues to be effective.

Currently, 90.6% of advertising agency staff in the UK are from a white background. 70% of the 9.4% of staff that are non-white work in low level support disciplines. 85% of advertising in this country is aimed at women, but 90% of all communications campaigns are created by men.

Clearly there needs to be a drastic shift in these numbers before Advertising can call itself a truly diverse industry.

Robin Wight, CVO, President of Engine and Founder of the Ideas Foundation introduced the ‘Diversity in Advertising’ film, made by Media Citizens for Clever Peeps and Ideas Foundation, said “the call to action from the film is to ‘join the conversation’ on the Diversity in Advertising Facebook page. From here will, to an extent, be informed by the key points made on the launch evening. We ultimately hope that this event will spur on the change needed so that the advertising industry is less narrow in its recruitment processes and its approach to a diverse workforce.”

Some important statistics...

• In 2006 the advertising industry was worth £56.5bn, roughly 8% of the UK economy
• By 2016 half of the (BME) population will be under the age of 12 whereas half of the white population will be under 40
• Indian households are most likely to own multiple cars or vans with 80% owning at least one
• South Asian and African Caribbeans still represent the largest ethnic groups.
• Black British women spend six times more on hair products than their white counterparts.
• Britain’s ethnic minorities make up 7% of all car owners and are three times more likely to own a BMW
• 13% of all UK companies are Asian owned

Issues considered by the panel:

• Should unpaid internships be banned in the creative industries, thus allowing a more diverse intake? Is this viable?
• What kind of new training initiatives could be implemented to specifically facilitate the career advancement of ethnic minority staff who are already employed in the creative industries, albeit in low level roles?
• What can we as an industry learn from other industries that have had more success in fostering diversity?
• What are the IPA doing to increase diversity in Advertising?
• Why are the statistics on diversity in advertising so poor?
• What do you think is the solution to the problem?
• What are your opinions on the work that organizations such as the Ideas Foundation are already doing in the interests of diversity?
• Are you worried that hiring people based on their ethnicity in an attempt to remedy the problem could be viewed as positive discrimination and might even impact on business?

The people behind the event:

The Ideas Foundation, founded by Robin Wight in 2003, is a charity dedicated to equipping young people from disadvantaged backgrounds, with the skills they need to gain employment in the creative industries. They run projects, create links and broker placements in the industry in order to do this.

Media Citizens is a digital communications agency equally at home creating films and editorial content as it is developing websites and mobile apps. The company works across private, public and third sectors and also runs a social inclusion arm, engaging young people in media creation.

Clever Peeps is an advertising blog that showcases all the best work out there. It is run by Faisal Ahmed, who approached Ideas foundation with the idea of a diversity in advertising film to help drive awareness of the lack of diversity in the industry and hired media citizens to produce the films.