Carsten Heintzsch

The ban was a response to an agreement made among 18 German agencies to limit the number of awards shows they would enter, according to Carsten Heintzsch, executive creative director of Saatchi & Saatchi and a spokesman for those agencies.

The dispute began when another Hatchuel-owned awards-show property, the Eurobest Awards, was excluded from The Creative Index, a list of award shows 18 German agencies have agreed upon entering as a way to cut the cost of entry fees and create a level playing field for competing shops, said Carsten Heintzsch, executive creative director at Saatchi & Saatchi, Frankfurt, who acts as the spokesman for the agencies.

According to Heintzsch, Hatchuel announced to the German trade press on Friday last week that because Eurobest had been excluded from The Creative Index for a second year in a row, Germans would be banned from the judging at next year's festival.
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Heintzsch, along with executives from 10 other top German agencies, responded with a letter to Hatchuel, also released to the press on Monday, criticizing his apparent ultimatum regarding Cannes as a way to force agencies to enter Eurobest and calling for him to revoke the ban.
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The letter, which Heintzsch expected Hatchuel to receive today, said, in part, "We sadly recognize that you are giving evidence to all critics who say that your creative awards shows and the selection of your jury members... are abused for commercial purposes of your family."
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The appropriateness of The Creative Index is debatable, Heintzsch said on Tuesday, but defended its intention."I think saving costs on awards shows is a sensible thing.We're not sure if [the index] is the right way.Maybe we should think about other ways.That's one thing, but threatening a country -- and this could happen to other countries in the world-threatening a country in that way is not right," he said."This is old fashioned and a bit mafia, I think." Heintzsch said the German ad executives had no intention of adding the Eurobest awards to the index, but that he hoped they could reach an agreement with Hatchuel soon.If the situation escalates, he said, he predicts that many German agencies will boycott Cannes completely next year."If we are not invited to be judges, we don't feel invited at all."But, he adds, "It's a long time until March.I think we can work things out.Next week things will look different."

--- Mallorre Dill Published: October 09, 2002

NEW YORK -- The International Advertising Festival in Cannes has said it won't ban German judges, a move that had been threatened after a dispute last month with several German agencies, according to Carsten Heintzsch, a spokesman for the German agencies and executive creative director of Saatchi & Saatchi, Frankfurt.

The conflict began over the exclusion of the Eurobest awards (owned by the Hatchuel family, which also owns the Cannes festival) from the Creative Index, a list of awards shows that 18 German agencies had agreed to enter as a way to cut costs and level the playing field among competing agencies.

As part of the agreement to return German judges, the agency executives agreed to re-evaluate the Index, according to Heintzsch."We won't re-think the basic [tenet of the Index], which is to save money on awards shows.A lot of people do that," he said.But the agencies will consider sending a few entries to Eurobest, "so they don't feel excluded," he said.

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Heintzsch said he was happy to see the conflict with Hatchuel end peaceably."[Cannes] is like Christmas for creative people worldwide.It was like your father saying you can't come to Christmas.

CCO: Carsten Heintzsch