The Big Shout: From the horses mouth

Marketing is riddled with business owners who act as the public face of their brands.

Traditionally they appeared in the actual advertising - Victor Kiam of Remmington was an early one with a fantastic slogan " I Ioved the product so much, I bought the company!" Closer to home the late bootiful Bernard Matthews waxed lyrical about Turkeys

and we loved him.

Then as advertising became slicker and more about a brand the role of the owner was one of high powered achievement driving the brand forward. All sorts of household names appear in this category - Sir Richard Branson, Philip Green, Lord Sugar, Bernie Ecclestone even Simon Cowell is a brand ambassador for manufactured pop.

None of these however actually produce the products themselves - they were and are great business people, some with incredible creative talent but all with unusual vision and ability to build and proliferate brands but they don't make anything.

I love listening to the people who create products and in writers and artists we have the ideal candidates. The creative talking about their product is often a hit and miss affair but at least you know you are listening to the real thing - not a load of hype or marketing speak. Genuine reminiscences of how they wrote the book or painted the picture or in the case of one of my personal favourites Gerald Scarfe, how he helped Pink Floyd build The Wall.