Pantone's hitting a very peri patch ➜

Hope everyone's set for things to go a little Prince shaped next year, with news this week that Pantone has announced it's colour of the year for 2022 as Very Peri. To us it looks a lot like purple, but a Pantone spokesperson states that Very Peri is the “happiest and warmest of all the blue hues” because it “blends the faithfulness and constancy of blue with the energy and excitement of red”. Hmm, that'll be purple then. Either way, you can expect to see Pantone 17-3938 become a staple across fashion, interiors and marketing design over the coming months. Designers, load your palettes!

Cheap date? ➜

What's that? £2.33 for a glass of champagne? In an uber-exclusive Mayfair hangout? You're 'aving a giraffe mate? Er, actually not – as, in this absolutely superb experiential marketing stunt, Aldi has opened the UK's cheapest champagne bar, in one of London's most expensive locations. Their pop up Vueve Bar, at Gees Court – St Christopher's Place, is selling it's own finest house fizz, Veuve Monsigny, for just £2.33 a glass, or if you really want to push the boat out, £13.99 a bottle. For those of us trying to live a champagne lifestyle on a lemonade budget, this is surely as good as it gets!

Creative Review curates their best ads of 2021 ➜

It's been a turbulent year, to say the least, but adland seems to be one of the few places where fallout from the pandemic hasn't been utterly destructive? With agencies adapting to remote working models and film and photography sets having to become Covid compliant, the challenges have been present, but not insurmountable. In fact, as this Creative Review run down of the years best ads shows, in some cases (take a bow Extra and McDonalds), it actually provided the spark for some glorious creativity.

Out of home goes meta! ➜

More madness incoming, as Ocean, one of the UK's leading outdoor advertising companies, has struck a deal with Admix to provide out of home billboards and advertising spaces within the metaverse. This is getting "a bit Inception" now... That's an out of home, within a home. (Assuming one will usually be at home, when traversing the metaverse). Maybe it isn't such a strange play, as lots of big brands are feeling the FOMO and covering bets in the virtual space right now. We just wish it wasn't so. As, 1) it's got something of a snake oil shine to it, and 2) the actualverse ain't so bad!

The Drumbeat Drop is our candid take on the weird, wired, wonderful world we work in.


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