Drugi jezik na kojem je dostupan ovaj članak: Bosnian
By: Ekrem Dupanović
This was my first visit to Skopje after 25 years. I went there at the invitation of I&F McCann Group, to visit the Macedonian McCann, in the company of Marija Vićić, director of communications. I have great private ties to Skopje so I was a bit excited, even though I knew in advance that due to the short stay there will be nothing from meeting with my private contacts. I went there with the prejudice that the situation in Macedonia is very poor and that the center of Skopje looks quite kitschy due to the large number of monuments. I felt no crisis, nor did I have time for that, and the center of Skopje looks like the center of Berlin, where the building of the Macedonian government resembles the Bundestag. Truth be said, there is an excess of monuments, but it did not seem so bad, at least to me. I guess because I expected it to be much worse. It’s the same as when you are watching a movie that has just won ten Academy Awards, and at the end you don’t like it because you expected a miracle.
Anyway, Maria and I landed in Skopje on Thursday afternoon. We were greeted by McCann’s driver who took us to the city. Earlier I agreed with Elena Mladenovska-Jelenković, director of marketing at Tikveš, that I will first stop by at their place, because their business complex is on the way between the airport and the city. Meeting with Elena was very cordial. It will be two years soon since we know each other. Tikveš sponsored our The Cup in Belgrade (April, 2014) and that cooperation remained in very good memory because Tikveš did everything at the top level. Sveto Janevski, owner of Tikveš, and I are friends, and that as well ties me with this very successful Macedonian company (Sveto was traveling abroad, however, so we couldn’t meet). Premium wine and art go hand in hand in the world, so I was wondering how Tikveš is related to culture and art, how they support these segments. I was looking for examples of good practice in the region for our new portal Art&Business, which we launched three months ago and whose number of visitors is increasing day by day. Elena said that they are very present at the events of culture and art, and that they will have plenty of material for us. She also confirmed that we can count on the support of Tikveš, as the official wine at the gala ceremony AD Woman of the Year, on 17 November at the Belgrade Hyatt, as well as for the Art&Business Awards, 17 October, in hotel Sheraton, Zagreb.
After the meeting, Elena and I went together to McCann Skopje. I introduced Maria and Elena and I’m very glad that I made that contact, because that should have happened long ago, which was evident from the cordiality in their conversation over the next half hour. The next day Marija, on my departure from Skopje, said that Elena has left a great impression on her and that she was very glad to have met her.
It was already time to go to the University American College, where at 18h30 I was to hold a lecture for students. In fact, when we were arranging the trip to Skopje, Marija asked me to hold two lectures. One for the students of the American College, and one for the employees of McCann Skopje.
The meeting with students was very inspiring for me, but I’m not sure that they quite understood me. Our language is still largely unknown to young Macedonians. But it was good, and I think they were satisfied in the end. The main message I wanted to convey to them is that they shouldn’t wait for an opportunity served on a plate, but to immediately start creating the image of their future employer, to come up with a story about themselves that they want to sell, to roll up their sleeves and fight for their ideas. Nothing is impossible and I illustrated that with some examples from my own experience. An hour passed quickly.
After the lecture I experienced a similar situation to the one that Bane Brkljač had two weeks earlier at Fruška Gora. There, Velibor Zolak, the new governor of Rotary District Serbia and Montenegro, held a two-day seminar for the most prominent members of the Rotary clubs from Serbia and Montenegro, and invited several non-rotarians to tell them about his job. Velibor invited Ivan Stanković, I invited Bane, there were also few other speakers, among whom the one who most impressed me was prof. Branislav Mićunović, a prominent Montenegrin theater director who now lives in Belgrade as the Montenegrin ambassador. After Bane gave his famous lecture about Kosmodisk, a member of the Rotary Club of Subotica stood up from the front row and said: “I’m glad Mr. Brkljač to have heard this fantastic success story of Kosmodisk. I signed your certificate that Kosmodisk can be put into the market.” Bane was surprised. “You are Velimir Stefanović? I know of you. They wouldn’t give us the certificate in Novi Sad, so we sent the documents to Subotica and you solved it. I am very happy to meet you.” Later, I told Bane: “Here’s why you had to come to Fruška Gora. Now you’ve went full circle with your Kosmodisk story.”
After my lecture for Skopje students, a lady who was sitting in the front row came to me and said: “I am Angelika Peeva Laurenčič, wife of Ivo Laurenčič. Ivo told me about you, I know you were friends.” This meeting was for me a big surprise. All the time on the plane between Belgrade and Skopje I was thinking about Ivo. Several times he called me to come, but the time was not in our favor. I delayed, and now I was going to Skopje, sad that I will not have the chance to see my friend, a legend and a rock of a man who left us too soon. I spent with him a couple of days in Budva, at the festival For Fest with Velibor Zolak (unavoidable Veljo, here he is for the second time in this story). He went for surgery in Vienna from right there in Budva, and from there on things took a turn for the worse. Angelika and I have agreed to stay in touch, I promised to come to Skopje on 13 May on the anniversary of Ivo’s death, and that two of us will start compiling a story about Ivo that will appear on that day on our website. That evening, and the next day, on several occasions I heard from different people that even today, when they meet, they often talk about Ivo Laurenčič. He was a great charmer and a gentleman.
The day ended with a dinner with the core team of McCann Skopje in an excellent restaurant with a bit complicated name that I was not able to remember.
Friday began at half past seven with an early morning coffee with Boris Eftimovski, founder and chief editor of the portal Marketing 365. We talked about our work and concluded that our problems with the industry to which we are dedicated are the same. Agencies involved in communication do not communicate, they are reluctant to invest in their own promotion and the like.
Then followed a meeting with employees of McCann and the story of how today’s regional advertising scene in the time of former Yugoslavia was created, ho it looks today and what changes occurred in it, especially in the area of Digital. Again some things I illustrated with examples from my own practice. Given the somewhat older generation, I think they understood me quite well, unlike the students the night before.
Then a short meeting with director of McCann Skopje, Jelena Arsovski, where we arranged future cooperation.
After that I went for a coffee with Sašo Pešev, director of New Moment. We go way back, but this was the first time we met in Skopje. Immediately upon entering his office my eyes were drawn to the showcase with prizes. Two Cannes Lions and a “mountain” of awards from the Golden Drum and other festivals. I asked Sašo to explain the phenomenon of the Macedonian advertising. However you look at the market it’s small, and yet with so many successful agencies and so many awards. Three lions (if we add McCann’s lion that was the first one to come to Macedonia) and a host of other awards. OK, Serbia also has three Cannes Lions, but these Macedonian ones are much more valuable. To my remark Sašo laughs and says: “We work my friend, we work.”
Since Sašo Pešev is the president of the Macedonian association of the advertising industry, we discussed the expansion of cooperation. For now, we have agreed that we will receive more news from Macedonia and that we (the Association and Media Marketing) should soon do a joint conference. Time passes quickly, and so did the hour in conversation with Sašo. I hurried back to McCann because it was time for Marija and me to go to the airport.
I left Skopje with the firm intention to go back there as soon as possible.