Hall of Fame honours industry legends

Malaysia – The Accredited Association of Advertising Agents (4As) has recognised and inducted several legends who have and are setting the rising standards of the creative industry into its Hall of Fame.

In conjunction with the 30^th Kancil Awards Festival 2008, the 4As council vetted a list of about 40 and decided that the deserving seven would be: the late Peter Beaumont, the late Datuk Jaffar Mohamed Ali, Janet Yeo, the late John Machado, Kenneth Smith, Prof Emeritus Tan Sri Lim Kok Wing and Yasmin Ahmad.

Beaumont, Smith, Jaffar, Lim and Yeo were among the pioneers in Malaysia's 4As scene.

Beaumont was represented by his son Simon; Jaffar's award was accepted by DraftFCB managing director T. Renganathan; and Machado's wife Teoh Ee Sim accepted his award.

The achievements and contributions of the five and the multi-talented Machado and Yasmin fulfilled the criteria of the power and value of the brands they built, their contribution to human capital development and to Malaysian society at large.

Datuk Vincent Lee, 4As president and Naga DDB Chairman said the recognition was long overdue, adding they intended for the Hall of Fame tradition to continue. Lee, whose term as president ends in February, said he was confident that the incoming council will continue recognising the benchmark setting individuals in the industry.

“At the Malaysia’s Most Valuable Brands event yesterday we saw Malaysian brand values grow to RM61 billion but even that is not more valuable than these inductees, without whom would have not paved the way for the industry achievements we have today,” he said.

Tony Savarimuthu, vice president of 4As and McCann Worldgroup chief executive officer, called the seven individuals architects of a fun industry. “Advertising is the most fun you can have with your clothes on and I think we need to encourage people to come in and enjoy it and help see it grow,” he said.

With the help of Crush Malaysia, the 4As put together a video featuring their work and snippets of what other advertising gurus thought of them.

The video sparked off a discussion on the need to document and collate the past creative works in the industry and preserving it for the future generations.

Savarimuthu had said in collecting the videos of works of the seven inductees, the team had encountered a hard time sourcing for one of Beaumont’s works for Standard Chartered.

“We had obtained all these videos not from a single source but from everywhere, and we’re looking to archive works that we can find from Radio Televisyen Malaysia (RTM) and the Malaysian National Film Development Corporation (FINAS).

“But we just could not find Beaumont’s creation,” he lamented.

“Overall this particular project to archive them was great work but more importantly, we got to acknowledge the brands themselves – the inductees,” Savarimuthu added.

Lee concurred with the suggestion to compile creative works dating even from the yesteryears.

“We have to showcase the industry that laid the foundation because new players have no idea how the industry started and has since moved on,” he added.