Newspaper Conference × Shopping District Poster Exhibition [Part 2]

The annual Newspaper Convention, a major event in the newspaper industry, was held in Osaka on October 15 for the first time in 29 years. To coincide with this, five teams led by Kusaka, who had previously organized a shopping district poster exhibition to highlight the potential of newspaper advertising, each created a 15-column full-page advertisement for Kinki University's Faculty of International Studies. This unprecedented project saw advertisements with distinct creative concepts published in the morning editions of the five major national newspapers on the day of the Newspaper Convention.

In the second part of the tripartite discussion between Mr. Seko, Director of Public Relations at Kinki University, and Kusaka and Hoshihara from the Shopping District Poster Exhibition, the conversation continues about the sense of crisis facing private universities, Kinki University's initiatives, and Mr. Seko's ambitions.
Furthermore, Yuri Otsuki, who handled the copy for the Nikkei edition, wrote the customary afterword for KanKuri Tsushin.

Newspaper Contest × Shopping District Poster Exhibition [Part 1] is here

A sense of crisis is the source of excitement

Kusaka: Was inviting Tsunku♂ to the entrance ceremony and Takafumi Horie to the graduation ceremony also to get people interested?

Sekō: Of course, we wanted to generate buzz. But beyond just conveying a single event, we want people to feel "this is the stance our university takes." Many universities advertise a "free-spirited atmosphere," but their ads themselves are anything but free, right? That's why Kindai University creates ads where freedom shines through visually.

Also, many people associate Kindai with being "energetic," "approachable," or "innovative" – and that's exactly what we've communicated through our advertising. Conversely, we seem to lack the "refined" or "serious" image many other universities have. But honestly, I don't think refined and serious talent is in demand these days.

Kusaka: But inviting Tsunku♂ to the entrance ceremony—that must have sparked a lot of opinions, right?

Sekō: Entrance ceremonies aren't as lively as graduation ceremonies. After all, at that point, they don't have any friends yet. They're nervous. Plus, every university has a certain number of "unwilling entrants" among the freshmen. People thinking, "I wasn't supposed to come to this university." Don't you want those people to switch gears after the ceremony and think, "Alright, I'll give it my best here!"? So, what could get all 7,000 freshmen excited and moving together? That's why we felt compelled to invite Tsunku♂, who's also an alumnus. Some people opposed it until the end, but it ended up being a huge success – it got everyone really hyped and became a big talking point.

Kusaka: Do you always act out of necessity? Or do you do things because you want to do something interesting?

Sekō: Of course we're driven by necessity. Like the 2014 ad with a tuna head sticking out of a mountain, or being the first to introduce an online application system. We've done interesting things despite criticism because, as I mentioned earlier, we're facing the 18-year-old population problem head-on. We have a strong sense of crisis, so we do interesting things as countermeasures. It's not just fooling around; I think being able to seriously do interesting things is a privilege of Osaka.

Kyoto universities showcase temples, Kobe universities highlight the sea—each promotes their region's history and culture with an academic flair. But Osaka can't do that. We don't have the perfect thing to promote. Tsutenkaku Tower? Minami's neon district? They just don't fit. But then we realized: for Osaka, "comedy" is a legitimate culture. So we decided to promote comedy academically. It might look like a joke, but the substance is dead serious.

Kusaka: Is the increase in applicants from outside Osaka Prefecture a result of that appeal?

Sekō: Many students seem to come because they genuinely find it interesting or because they can study tuna research. Japan today judges universities solely by entrance exam scores, right? That's why universities have become places where getting in is the only thing that matters. I don't think this fosters people who can thrive globally. What matters is what you can study there and how you can study it.

Kusaka: What are Kindai University's ambitions for the future?

Sekō: I want to break down the outdated university values rooted in Japan. When today's parents say, "That's a good university," it only means it was a "good university" in their generation, or even their parents' generation. People who live their lives without thinking about universities after graduating, until their own children grow up, have no way of knowing what a good university is right now. Conversely, I think such baseless values can be easily shattered.

Even if it causes a firestorm, so what?

Kusaka: Mr. Seko, tell us about your own ambitions.

Sekō: I want to create something that goes viral on YouTube, like getting 100 million views. Something like the overseas "Dumb Ways to Die" (the Australian rail accident prevention campaign). That was also a public service ad about train etiquette, right? I was amazed they could achieve that much with it.

Kusaka: Wow, that would be a huge undertaking to create (laughs). That's Cannes Grand Prix level!

Hoshihara: But in this internet age, how much something spreads is really important, right?

Sekō: Exactly. Honestly, if you make an ad that's full of things to criticize in various ways, it might go viral through backlash and spread on its own. I think that's totally valid. Obviously, anything involving human rights is off-limits, but if it ends up generating buzz, even backlash is a win. With a limited budget, if it spreads like wildfire—whether the feedback is good or bad—that's the best outcome, right?

Hoshihara: Mr. Kusaka's past poster exhibitions also featured many works full of points to criticize, and that ended up being a factor in their spread, right?

Kusaka: Exactly, that low level of polish (laughs). But few clients would tolerate that, though.

Hoshihara: This newspaper contest project especially has a different kind of surprise factor compared to your usual poster exhibitions—like, "Wait, they're actually putting this in the paper?!"—and it's getting shared a lot, right?

Kusaka: In the end, like Mr. Seko said, maybe it all starts from a sense of crisis. The poster exhibitions started from that crisis feeling that recent ads are just so boring.

Hoshihara: This newspaper contest project also got significant cooperation because the newspaper company itself felt a sense of crisis. Kindai University, which shares that sense of crisis about the 18-year-old demographic, got on board with the project. Beyond the mutual crises we each face, the trust we'd built was a huge factor. That's why I think we were able to pull this project off.

Kusaka: So, with that, we conclude this discussion on Osaka's crisis.

Afterword

I'm Otsuki, a former Media Services / Newspaper Division employee who loved newspapers, pledged loyalty to them, and spent my first year at Dentsu Inc. in the Media Services / Newspaper Division. I'm honored to write this afterword.

Even after transferring to the Creative Division, I kept looking for opportunities to express my love for newspapers whenever possible. This time, that chance came to me—it was this Newspaper Conference!!! So, as the representative for the Nikkei team among the five participating teams, I joined in with great excitement alongside AD Inoue-kun.

Our project began by digging into the question: "Why did they implement a system requiring all first-year students to study abroad?" To immerse them in a foreign language? To develop an international perspective?? We floundered around with these clichéd answers for a moment. But then, looking at Kindai's past advertisements and orientation materials, we felt we glimpsed the university's stance behind this system. The framework of international education that many universities envision might feel too restrictive for Kindai's Faculty of International Studies. With this thought, we decided on a concept: visuals that scream "This doesn't look like studying at all!" paired with the dead-serious copy "Kindai Students. Studying."

We called in real Kindai students as models and shot them having fun with international students. But I was anxious right up until the shoot day. Could we really capture genuine, joyful moments when pointing a camera at amateurs...? That anxiety vanished within about five minutes of starting the shoot. "Don't you think I look more carefree like this? Doesn't this look more fun?" They even offered unexpected suggestions on their own initiative. These handsome guys, barely out of their teens, surely wanted to look cool in the photos. Or rather, they must have worried, "Is this really okay for appearing in a newspaper ad as the face of the university?!" Yet they perfectly grasped our concept and gave their all to fully embody the "comical" vibe. I was truly impressed.

And listening to Mr. Seko during this roundtable discussion really made things click for me. In a setting like this, you're supposed to behave a certain way by common sense. For a newspaper ad, you're supposed to look serious. But not being trapped by those assumptions, seeing through to the essence of things and cultivating the ability to think freely – that's what Kindai University means by "free education," I realized. And it's Mr. Seko and the university itself that have been leading by example, showing students such boldness.

Breaking conventions inevitably brings a sense of crisis. But only those who swiftly recognize the crisis inherent in the status quo—called "common sense"—and possess the courage to change it can build new conventions.

I believe this is also an essential skill for Dentsu Inc. employees who pioneer new work without being confined by the framework of "advertising" or the title of "agency." (Yuri Otsuki)