The Way I See It: Grant Hunter

I was attracted to working in the ad industy by the prospect of generating ideas that solve problems using creativity. To a teenage me that sounded like a dream. At the age of 15, I had my first taste of the creative industry with a work placement at a graphic designer’s studio in the little village I grew up in, on the edge of the Fens in Norfolk. 

Gareth, in the village, was a graphic designer and had his studio in a converted barn. My mum asked him if I could do work experience with him as I was always drawing. The studio was focused on branding for local engineering and construction firms. 

Ultimately without the bees we lose the pollinators that our natural world depends on – hence the attempt to do my bit to help keep our friends alive.

I also created an identity for a barn owl conservation trust. Not exactly blue chip multi-national brands but it gave me my first taste of getting paid for my creativity – that was eye-opening for 15 year old me. From then on, I’ve been hooked.

My path into advertising was by way of a visual communications course in Birmingham that was very focused on photography. My friend Simon Kirkham was more interested in the illustration strand of the course and reckoned joining forces as an advertising creative team would open up a good career path for us both. 

We put the plan into action in our second year and we had some great mentors. We were fortunate enough to be tutored by John Lowe, who’d taught Trevor Beattie, the British advertising guru and founder of BMB, and this connection gave us a thorough view of what the industry was all about through book crits and placements at GGT/TBWA where Trevor was CD at the time. We’d also built up a rapport with Jason Fretwell while there, as we worked our way through different placements. 

It then took a year for us to get our first proper job at IMP/Arc. Here, Andy Regan, former Creative Group Director at I.M.P and went on to be Head of Art at Iris, took us under his wing. It was his enthusiasm and energy that helped us in those early years. 

Among the work Hunter is most proud of is Iris Worldwide's What's Your Name campaign for Starbucks.

Along with my work at Iris I am involved with a sustainable modular buildings business call Bert’s Box that is revolutionising what prefabricated living means. It is a modular prefab system created from salvaged timber. They come in four sizes, from study box to two-bed. The bigger boxes come with pre-installed kitchens and bathrooms. They fall under the mobile caravan definition and can literally be lifted into place in a matter of hours. I’d happily go off the grid and live in one. 

It's the first time I’ve collaborated with my wife Caroline and her business partner, Lou and it was fun helping out with the brand marketing and social activity.

Beekeeping is another project of mine, it is a fascinating new craft to learn. It’s not as easy as I initially thought and with the changing weather patterns from year to year, each season I've been involved with so far has brought with it new challenges.

From robber bees to swarming to re-queening. They keep me on my toes. The colony when at full capacity can be 50,000 to 60,000 strong. A worker bee can travel three to five miles in search of nectar. Another fascinating fact is a bee’s sense of smell is 50 times more powerful than a dog’s. 

I think there’s an immense opportunity for us to use our creativity to promote more sustainable ways to live.

But ultimately without the bees we lose the pollinators that our natural world depends on. So hence the attempt to do my bit to help keep our friends alive. I’ve also created a series of robotic bees as part of an AI exploration. It's called the Bionic Bee Collection and is a look at a near future where the bees have died out so robotic versions have filled the void. 

Hunter has used AI to create a collection of robotic bees called the Bionic Bee Collection. 

The 2021 campaign we worked on for the Quadrature Climate Foundation, called The World Is Looking at You Cop26, was a real eye opener for me. I was stunned at the way landlords of the transport hubs were able to censor content according to what they felt would  ‘upset’ customers. They could effectively veto imagery that was at odds with the welcoming environment they aimed to cultivate in the hubs. 

We used portraits of real people, on the climate crisis frontline, whether they were battling floods in the UK’s home counties or hurricane damage in South Carolina or forest fires in France. The point being that the climate crisis is affecting everyone, everywhere. And it will affect those who have contributed the least to global emissions, the most. 

We create desire through the work we create, why can’t we use that creative super power to make a circular system the most desirable way to live?

Climate injustice is something we all have to acknowledge. It’s disappointing to still see the international community, and those who have the most leverage to make a difference, dragging their feet due to vested interests in fossil fuels. That said, it does feel like there is an awakening within our industry – attitudes are changing. The Purpose Disruptors study Advertised Emissions states that our industry contributes to 32 per cent of each person’s carbon footprint in the UK. 

I think there’s an immense opportunity for us to use our creativity to promote more sustainable ways to live. We create desire through the work we create, why can’t we use that creative super power to make a circular system the most desirable way to live.

I feel that organisations within the industry are beginning to respond to our drive to explore the decoupling of carbon emissions and sales. The movement is growing. More creative voices are recognising the opportunity to collectively build positive visions about what a net zero world could look like. At the recent Earth Day Ad Summit, musician and activist Brian Eno suggested that this could be the biggest social movement the world has ever seen. Change is afoot! 

Talking about the ad industry's role in conveying the truth about the climate crisis, Jonathan Wise, Founder of Purpose Disruptors, put it best at the Earth Day Ad Summit, where he said (to paraphrase) “the better we do our jobs the worse off the planet it”. 

The uncomfortable truth is that we create desire for stuff. We need to repoint our creative power towards shaping a new narrative whereby desire for a sustainable way of life is pedestalled. The quicker we transition, the better chance we have of creating a net zero world. 

A career highlight was Iris winning the bid to create the London 2012 Summer Olympics mascots, Wenlock and Mandeville.

The best piece of advertising work I’ve ever seen is not a traditional ad, it’s a piece of branded content. The Michelin Guide – a tyre manufacturer producing something that’s of real value to people. They went beyond their category into an area intrinsically linked to road trips. It was revolutionary in many ways and possibly the earliest example of quality branded content. 

We worked closely with the transgender community to make sure we really understood the lived experience of being dead-named – everyone on that project felt a duty of care to tell the stories in an authentic way.

It’s grown to become the gold standard of restaurant reviews. Ultimately, that’s what we should all be striving to do – create ideas that people want to participate with and in. Ideas that play a meaningful role in people's lives. 

As an agency, the work I’m most proud of is What’s your name? for Starbucks. As a complete body, I believe it encapsulates the power of our creativity; from the solid foundation in great insight leading to a genuinely nationwide conversation around identity in the UK. 

Being able to fund a helpline for the trans community for 18 months and discovering that transgender guys were posting videos on YouTube about trying their chosen names at Starbucks to see how it felt were incredibly humbling moments. 

We worked closely with the transgender community to make sure we really understood the lived experience of being dead-named [being referred to by your old name], everyone on that project felt a duty of care to tell the stories in an authentic way. I’m proud to say we achieved it.