On My Radar: Ben Stump and Simon Findlater

What’s the best ad campaign you’ve seen recently?

Stump [above left]: I loved the last Curry’s PC World Christmas campaign with Jeff Goldblum [Jigsaw, below]. Brilliant writing, brilliant acting, brilliantly directed.

Findlater [above right]: I like the recent Moneysupermarket ads. Dave’s Epic Strut still makes me smile. The idea is simple, fun and can go anywhere.

What website(s) do you use most regularly and why?

Stump: BBC and Nowness, for obvious reasons I think.

Findlater: BBC. I wake up and read the footie gossip, then check the news to see what’s happened overnight. At the moment it seems famous icons are dropping like flies.

What’s the most recent piece of tech that you’ve bought and why?

Stump: The Vamp [below]. Amazing bit of kit that turns any old hi-fi speaker into a portable Bluetooth one. Get one, it’s better than Sonos.

Findlater: My fitness tracker. It’s addictive. It also proves I am rubbish at sleeping.

Facebook, Instagram or Twitter?

Stump: What’s that saying? ‘Facebook is full of all the people you went to school with, Twitter and Instagram are full of all the people you wish you’d gone to school with’. I’d agree with that. Plus I’m a sucker for a ‘wanky’ Instagram photo.

Findlater: Facebook mainly; that’s just to find out what people (friends) are sharing etc. Also avoids me missing birthdays, which I am constantly reminded about.

What’s your favourite app on your phone and why?

Stump: An app called One Second Every Day. I’ve been taking a one-second video every day since my daughter was born and it makes for a pretty impressive film (if only for me and my wife).

Findlater: [Channel 4 app] All 4. It’s made my commute a lot more pleasurable. Plus I can watch stuff my wife isn’t interested in.

What’s your favourite TV show and why?

Stump: I’m always behind on these, but at the minute it’s Peaky Blinders. I’m hooked.

Findlater: Wouldn’t say show as such, more like documentaries. Louis Theroux, love him. Attenborough is a legend too.

What film do you think everyone should have seen?

Findlater: Toy Story. It’s timeless. Always looks fresh, technically revolutionary, and works like crack on my kids.

Stump: Cinema Paradiso. If you wrote down the storyline, you’d probably give it a miss, but the way it’s shot makes it mesmerizing.

Where were you when inspiration last struck?

Findlater: Probably TinderBox coffee shop in Paperchase. It’s where Ben and I disappear to, when we’re under the kosh. Sshhh… don’t tell anyone.

Stump: Most probably in bed just as I’m about to drift off to sleep. It drives me mad, but sometimes my subconscious is better at ideas than my conscious.

What’s the most significant change you’ve witnessed in the industry since you started working in it?

Stump: The internet. I started out when digital was meant to be coming to takeover the traditional agency. That didn’t happen because ideas are still king. But the internet has affected how we view these ideas. Now everyone is always online, particularly on mobile phones, so we need to be savvy about how we grab their ever-decreasing attention spans.

Findlater: Time, we get less of it. Less time to think, less time to craft. Be good to grab some back.

If there was one thing you could change about the advertising industry, what would it be?

Findlater: Be brave – we’re not coming up with a cure for AIDs, we’re writing ads. They should be entertaining, touching, thought provoking, provocative… We recently made an ad for Kelly’s ice cream that was spoken in fluent Cornish [above]. That’s pretty brave for any client, but it worked for them.

Stump: We need to keep hold of our craft skills. Our industry produces more content now than ever before, but that doesn’t mean the quality of work should suffer. Doing things quicker shouldn’t mean doing them worse. It’s true that anyone with a mobile phone can create a film these days, but what sets our industry above is craft; craft in the idea, craft in the execution. We should always be setting the bar for others to try and follow.

What or who has most influenced your career and why?

Stump: So many people. But probably anyone we've worked in a creative department with. Being surrounded by other creative people makes you better.

Findlater: He may have been a boring accountant, but my dad was an inspiration. He never rested, and that will be forever ingrained in me.