Brands x People | My Week at Cannes Lions Festival

Day 1 | Kicking Off with Women Who Brand 🎙️

Day 1 at Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity — starting the most creative week with LIVE podcast recordings of Women Who Brand in partnership with Brands&Culture and CROING l Creative Agency

Denée Pearson, it was so lovely to see you again and kick off the day with you as my first podcast guest. I’ll be recording more conversations tomorrow at the Brands & Culture Villa from 1 to 3 PM — if you're a woman who brands, come join me. Your voice matters 💫

My favorite events of the day:

💜 As always, The Female Quotient feeling just so right! I loved it all, specially the first panel — it brought such a powerful insight: the way we speak — our accent, tone, and expressions — often shapes how others perceive our intelligence or value. Crazy world, but happy that this conversations are happening so we can make better! So lovely seeing you there Sally Barton!

🏠 ADWEEK House — we were welcomed at Le Majestic Hotel with truly powerful conversations from Katie Daleo, Samantha Avivi, Julia Fedor, Eric Flinn, Rankin Carroll, Mark Weinstein, Jason Acker, Allegra Krishnan, Dara Treseder, Mario Dughi and more. So much to reflect on and build from.

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Day 2 | “Ocean Experience,” Emotions & Women’s Football 🌊

I called my outfit today “Ocean Experience” — I felt like I was swimming in creativity and friendship 🤭 (Bad joke, I know… it sounded better in my head.)

Here are some of today’s highlights — not including the The Coca-Cola Company x Adobe Experience activation, because that one definitely deserves its own post.

💄 Laurie Lam from E.L.F. BEAUTY said “my abuela” in Spanish — and I genuinely felt like she was talking to me. That’s the kind of emotional connection I believe brands should aim for. She clearly knows how to build a brand and get closer to people. Always so lovely to see you!

🏠 Jenny Rooney, always inspiring at the ADWEEK House. So happy that CROING l Creative Agency and I are part of the family — and it all started with you!

Highlight of the day: running into Paula M. — my strategy professor turned friend — right in the heart of the world’s #1 creativity festival. What a full-circle moment.

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Day 3 | Creator Power, Latina Perspective & Real Conversations 🤳🏻

Today from Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity, I was reflecting on how — as a Latina — my brain is trained to solve problems and that’s exactly how I approach creativity at CROING l Creative Agency

That creative mindset was front and center today at the festival, where powerful insights — like those shared by my friend Katie Welch, CMO of Rare Beauty — reminded us that asking is the new searching. Because asking sparks conversation, and conversation builds community. That’s exactly how creators connect — not by broadcasting, but by listening, co-creating, and showing up with real value.

Speaking of creators: one of my all-time favorites, hashtag#SelenaGomez, actually inspired the Horchata Oreo flavor — a beautiful nod to her Mexican roots, as shared by Ivanna Franko from hashtag#Oreo 

Highlights of the day:

👑 Listening to Patrick O'Keefe talk about what’s next for E.L.F. BEAUTY — empowering women and girls and changing lives. That’s what gets him up every morning… same here.

🍟Reconnecting with Jennifer Healan from McDonald's’s and meeting her colleague Morgan Flatley.

🤳🏻 Meeting Jamie Gutfreund — the kind of woman this industry needs: real, direct, and authentic. I loved everything she shared with the creator community, especially about speaking to your audience the way it speaks.

💜 Celebrating the power of our comunidad with Latinas and Spanish speakers shaping the industry: Patricia Corsi 🇧🇷 🇮🇹🇨🇭 from Kimberly-Clark , Josefien Olij from Philips, Fabiola Torres from Gap and of course, the amazing Melanie Tobal, who continues to create impact, and Yan De Simone (she/her/ella).

If anyone still questions the power of creators, just ask MCoBeauty: Bethenny Frankel discovered one of their products, made a genuine viral video, and soon started collaborating directly with Meridith Rojas, the brand’s brilliant CMO. It’s not just about product quality — it’s about genuine creator-brand connections that truly resonate with audiences.

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Day 4 | Full US Latinos Day at Cannes: Culture, Connection & Creativity ✨

US Latino Day at Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity and me talking 🎤— as always — about how to get brands closer to our people — just like we do at CROING l Creative Agency

Joshua Burke, from The Coca-Cola Company, shared how music and culture marketing have evolved — from one-way messaging to a three-way conversation between brands, creators, and communities. Creators are now at the center of how culture moves and at hashtag#CROING, we don’t build campaigns for communities, we co-create with them. 

💡 I was equally fascinated by the honesty of Nathalia Amadeu, from hashtag#Vaseline, as she shared how they faced internal fears about letting people use Vaseline on their own terms — even if that meant fixing doors with it.“Our job was not to control. It was not to judge. Our job was to bring clarity.” That sentence perfectly captures a new era of marketing — one where the goal is not to protect the message, but to amplify the meaning.

One surprise has been seeing the Venezuelan flag more and more. I have no words for us — we just know what it means, and it brings me to tears to see us here, where creativity is celebrated. Porque si somos algo, es creativos/as. Gracias, Andrea Diquez and Gabriela Fenton for having me ❤️

It was so lovely to see you again, Najoh Tita-Reid and to hear that your team includes amazing Latinas — can’t wait for what’s coming!

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Day 5 | Clients, Culture & Closing Moments by the Sea ☀️

My last day in Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity had it all: meeting clients, awards, and… a little beach time too ☀️

This festival is such an important reminder for marketers, brand leaders, creatives, strategists, and designers that we need to step out of our daily routines, share insights and ideas, and cross perspectives to understand where culture is going — and how we can walk alongside it through our work.

So lovely to see you, Laurie Lam — hashtag#CannesLions kind of marks our anniversary now 🤭

So nice crossing paths with so many brilliant people: Ekta Chopra, from E.L.F. BEAUTY, Afke Van de Klashorst, Cecilia Bottai Mondino, Scott Mellin, Sean Summers, and Aba Blankson 💫

The best way to close such a powerful week was by swimming a bit on la Riviera and celebrating with everyone at the Palais — surrounded by the energy that only Cannes can bring.

Big thanks to the CROING l Creative Agency team for the support from different parts of the world and for keeping everything running with so much love while I was here. We’re people-centred — and this week reminded me just how powerful that truly is.