What if we run out?

Ad people think of ideas to solve advertising problems. How do we do it?

In the initial concept stage, we go for quantity, not quality. We let the crap seep out. We churn our minds inside out. We dump every idea remotely related to the problem.

An average thinking session should generate 20 to 30 ideas. If we are lucky, we'll find 2 are good, 6 or 7 are interesting and the rest suck. Without missing a beat, we enter another session and we repeat till the ideal solution turns up.

We have nightmares of the day our ideas run dry. That is why we stock up on trivia and information people have for their day jobs. We rack up irrelevant stuff in the hope of turning it into gold.

When the day comes and we run out of ideas, what happens then?

The world will not stop. Neither will the skies crumble into the embrace of the blue oceans. The invisible hand will not rest and the wheels of capitalism will not grind to a halt. People still love people. Babies still cry. Bees still make honey and the flowers still bloom.

The ad man will shrug his shoulders and head for the streets, where his readers are. The answers don't lie inside our heads. The answer lies inside the readers' minds, and hearts. Too often, we learn this fact only when our ideas don't work and our minds are empty.

The day our ideas run out is the day our minds empty and we open our eyes to see.