82: One of Britain's most awarded copywriters, Nick Asbury, dismantles brand purpose

This week, we laid bait of lofty vision statements and years of intricate tax dodging, to lure one of Britain’s most-awarded copywriters from the shadows. Locked and loaded to lob a few volleys at brand purpose, he’s Nick Asbury.   A brilliant writer and a thoroughly good bloke to boot, Nick crafts witty and charming words for branding and design.  Pile your plate high as Nick talks to us on how a poem about the England football team got him in real trouble, differentiating between writing for design versus writing for ads, Paul Newman’s salad dressing, using wit (properly), a Friends NFT, why the Innocent imitators in packaging copy need to cut it out, and his plans to dismantle brand purpose. You won’t be disappointed.  ///// Check out Nick’s Substack  Especially his blog Start with why, end with wire fraud     Follow him on Twitter   He’s one half of Asbury & Asbury   Alongside, Sue Asbury, whose ace paintings you should check out here   Read The Nations Prayer poem that got him in real trouble    Buy the Perpetual Disappointments Diary   Here’s Realtime Notes   Clive James on Desert Island Discs  And the brilliant Ends Fri Friends ad  Timestamps (02:05) - Quickfire questions  (05:22) - First-ever job  (13:31) - Writing for design versus writing for advertising  (18:50) - A Smile in the Mind  (22:05) - Use of wit in advertising and design  (27:05) - Brand purpose (🔥) (54:54) - Listener questions from Paul Bailey and Andrew Spurrier Dawes (1:02:26) - 4 pertinent posers Room for more? In this episode, we plugged a choice cut of Call to Action episodes for you to get your chops around.  Andrew Spurrier Dawes  Thomas Kolster   Steve Harrison   Paul Feldwick   Nick’s book recommendations are: Nonzero by Robert Wright   A Smile in the Mind by Beryl McAlhone, David Stuart, Greg Quinton & Nick Asbury   In Pursuit of the Common Good by Paul Newman & A.E. Hotchner   The Anatomy of Humbug by Paul Feldwick   /////