Don’t think — just do.

If your marketing performance is in a rut, be a Maverick

Harry Lang for The Kwalee Blog

Visitors to my old house in London rarely commented on the quality of my art collection. Yes, the oil of Battersea Power station (purchased after an all nighter at Fabric and costing exactly one month’s salary in 2001) is very beautiful. And the the pixelated nude (OK, quite pornographic) acryllic that hung on the bathroom wall certainly prompted a few debates about whether all art can be considered ‘good’ art (it can’t, apparently). But the one piece that caused the most enjoyment hung above the downstairs loo — it was majestic.

A rugged, albeit petite aviator leaning pensively on the fuselage of his F14 Tomcat as he stares, knowingly into the middle distance. Yes, it was Tom Cruise in his original Maverick guise — a signed piece, no less.

Don’t worry — this isn’t about to turn into ‘Top Gun is an analogy for marketing’ tropes.

I’d accidentally purchased said artwork at a charity ball, a guest of my friends at Red Bull. There’d been a blind auction and having just witnessed my agency business go through it’s final death throws and my bank account slip into the red, I was perfectly placed to make a sizable bid.

Yes, I was so broke I had to carry Maverick home on the bus from Central London…