Stunts are proofs of concept that get the press to write about you.

principle — attributed to Michael Cirino

Cirino's six-course gourmet meal on the L-line subway from Manhattan to Brooklyn was not about feeding twelve diners. It was about proving that the format could exist. The New York Times wrote about it. Fifteen hundred other publications followed. The press coverage validated the agency in ways no portfolio could. Stunts at this scale are operational instruments, not eccentricities. They prove the firm can execute against extraordinary constraints and that the team can think beyond conventional production. Agencies that build a portfolio of stunts get hired for the work that nobody else will attempt.

For creative agencies, experiential firms, and brand builders thinking about how to demonstrate distinctive capability. The principle is most useful when the agency wants to be known for work the established firms will not touch.

stunts, proof-of-concept, press-strategy, audacious-execution