Nov 7, 2008

The Dangerous thing of doing a favor.


As you all may already know by heart, I have a dead beat dad. The wonderful thing is, like many other stuff or people in my life that I don't like, I have been able to delete him from my life and move on. You cannot imagine how precious my life is without him. Nope, this post is not about him. I am using this piece of shit man to make a point. You see, when you are in advertising, the most suckiest people ever in the world will call you up to ask for a favor. Let me explain.

I have made sure that this man does not even have my phone. But I guess I didn't alert the proper authorities, because a couple of years ago, he actually had the ball sack to call me and ask for a favor. Can you design this logo for me? I almost went ballistic. WHAT? You don't call for 15 years and you want a fucking logo? Up yours, man. I would gladly design a logo for the devil himself instead of you. I mean... talk about a nice pair of hairy testes.

Fast forward to today. A friend calls. Seems that a high school "friend" of mine wants another favor. She may need some designs for some crap idea she wants to sell. Again. You don't call for 20 years (almost) and now you want me to help? People sure have balls.

Damn it. Have people watched Godfather enough? Did any of you see Don Vito kill someone just because he was someone else's neighbor? No man, favors are done specifically for those who have done something back or those who you know for sure will return the favor down the line someday.

The real beef that I have with us designers and copy doing favors is... people think it's very easy. People think we have all the time in the world, that we can stop working on a campaign which will probably pay the rent, power and car, just to do a simple logo. We got news for you people: it's not so easy. It takes hours, even days to deliver anything that is at least decent - well, except the 2012 London logo, don't get me started on that one.

If I had a nickel for everytime I've heard: can you design my baby's birthday card, can you design my wedding invitation, can you design a logo for my boat... can you this... can you do that... And then, when you give in and actually help out, they don't ever call you back, even to say... hey, how's it hanging?

Don't get me wrong. I do favors for those extremely good friends that I adore. In fact, I don't even call them favors. Good friends are there for you not only for favors, but for nice chats, a drink once in a while, a call to see what you are up to... so those people have my total backup for anything they need. But for those who just appear when they need you... no way man.

So. A favor. Ha. Bona Sera. Bona Sera.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

I so share your point of view! Even though, I'm a account person, people come up to me "Hey, I need an idea... Actually need it until tonight. So, yeah, let's become friends on facebook and email it there, k?"

Same thing worldwide I guess, hello from Germany!

-Feli-

Joker said...

Feli, you can be from any department and have this happen to you. I think the worst would be in media where total strangers who don't know your name ask you for free tickets as if they're entitled to them. Glad to have you reading and always interesting to have an account person's counterpoint. Cheers

Joker

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