• by Richard Whitman , Columnist, September 10, 2018

While W+K and Nike have taken more than a little bit of heat over the last couple of weeks for its controversial ad with Colin Kaepernick, another controversial ad addressing racial issues continues to rack up the awards. 

And deservedly so. 

I refer to the Procter & Gamble ad “The Talk,” created by BBDO that features African American parents explaining to their kids the facts of life—that racism exists, they’re going to experience it and that they’re going to have to deal with it, move past it and do whatever they want to do in life despite it. 

On Saturday, “The Talk” won this year’s Prime Time Commercial Emmy Award, which was presented by the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences in Los Angeles during the Creative Arts Emmy Awards gala. 

Earlier this year, “The Talk” was awarded a Grand Prix in Film at the Cannes Lions Festival. 

For the Emmy competition, “The Talk” was selected from a list of five commercial nominees that  included another P&G entry, “It’s a Tide Ad,” the anti-bullying PSA “In Real Life” (also from BBDO New York), iPhone’s “The Earth” and Amazon’s “Alexa Loses Her Voice.”  

It’s the fourth time in the 20-plus year history of the Commercial Emmy that P&G has won this award and third time for BBDO (including the very first commercial Emmy in 1997 for “Chimps” for HBO). 

Cheers to P&G and BBDO and Nike and W + K for stepping up and addressing an issue that, sadly, is still prevalent in the U.S. and other regions—racial bias. 

Here’s hoping that Nike and W+K receive similar recognition for their efforts. I’m betting they will.