Meet Me on the Croisette: An Insider's Guide from an Outsider

I asked the Cannes experts, so you don't have to

I created a role called Director of Vibe in 2010. Brands have been copying it ever since. You’d think someone with that title would have been at Cannes years ago, but the festival always felt like it was speaking a different language, inside baseball for the advertising world, awards for campaigns I didn’t work on, conversations that lived one step removed from where I actually work. I watched it every June and never quite found the door.

The height of those Director of Vibe days before everyone used it

Then those things started collapsing into each other. Earned media and brand strategy and creator marketing and advertising aren’t really separate conversations anymore, and Cannes is where they all end up in the same room for one week. Canva just expanded their space there by a factor of 3. The creator track had to move to a larger beachfront venue because it outgrew its original location. A newsletter I follow said this year it’s “as if a memo went out” about how many people in marketing and communications suddenly decided this is the conference.

There’s also the business side of it. Cannes has become one of the biggest deal-making moments on the marketing calendar. Brands, CMOs, platform leads, all in the same place for a week, and the deals that shape the next twelve months happen in those rooms. I’ve been a secondary piece to that action for long enough. The other thing I keep thinking about: so many of the brands we work with have every reason to be there. I want to see it for myself first.

I leave Thursday. First time.

Before I get on the plane, I went to everyone I know who goes every year and asked them what they actually know. Not what’s on the website. Not what comes up when you Google first-timer tips for Cannes Lions, which I also did, and which is fine, but it’s not the same thing. I wanted the version that only exists when someone who’s been there hands it to you directly, because they remember what it felt like not to know. I am now putting all of that on the internet, which I realize is a little counterintuitive, but the whole point is that anyone else going for the first time, or thinking about going, or just trying to understand what the week actually looks like from the inside, has a reference point. So that we can all walk in looking like we’ve done this before. My old boss used to say fake it till you make it. This is the work you do so the faking is easier.

The week starts Sunday. Not Monday when the badges are scanned at the Palais. The dinners, the first gatherings where the tone of the whole week gets set, those happen before most people arrive. If you land Monday thinking you’ll ease in, you’re already behind. I’ll be there Saturday.

Set your meetings before noon. Multiple people said this without me asking specifically. Mornings at Cannes are quieter, people are sharper, conversations actually go somewhere. By lunch the day turns social and fluid in a way that’s good for some things and useless if you need a decision made. If something needs to happen, put it at 9 or 10am.

The coffee is terrible. Know where you’re going before you need it. The consistent answer: Good Mate on the Croisette. (Thanks Chris Danton )

If the coffee is terrible at least they will have wine and snacks

Canva has the best brand property if you need somewhere to land. Central, lots of seating, easy to run into people. Pinterest is also consistently mentioned. Both are worth knowing about in advance so you’re not wandering around looking for a chair when you’re already overheated.

RSVP to everything and sort it out as the week goes. The exception is a small intimate dinner where your no-show is going to inconvenience someone. For everything else, keep your options open. The calendar moves constantly and the best things tend to come from a last-minute follow-up to an invite you’d almost forgotten you accepted.

Comfortable shoes are non-negotiable. There are no pedicabs. You walk, a lot, somewhere around 15,000 to 20,000 steps a day in June heat on the French Riviera. Carry your nice shoes in your bag and swap at the door. The dress code is resort casual that can go either direction: comfortable enough for the Croisette at 2pm and pulled-together enough for cocktails at 7.

Bring a power bank. Your phone is your map, your RSVPs, your LinkedIn QR code, and your camera, and it will not survive the day. A dead phone at Cannes is a missed meeting.

Skip some of the panels. They’re recorded. You can watch the session about AI and creativity from your couch in July. What you can’t get back is the conversation happening at the cabana next to you, or the one that starts because you happened to walk past the right person between sessions. Be where the people are.

The days are for work, the evenings are for the relationships that turn into work. Once you understand that rhythm, the week makes sense. Lock your real meetings in the morning, leave the afternoons loose, and choose your dinners carefully, because that's where a contact becomes someone who actually calls you back.

Book your dinners before you land. Restaurants in Cannes fill up weeks in advance during festival week. Trying to find a table midweek once you’re already there is a special kind of frustrating. Lock them while you still have a clear head.

Pack more underwear than you think you need. I got this note early on, and my first reaction was that we’d be swimming in it. Then I asked around, and everyone said the same thing: it’s so hot you’ll want to change more than you’d realize. I’m choosing to see this as a sign from the universe, given that Wacoal is a client.

Come with a face sheet, or better yet, a dossier. I’ve been doing this my whole career. The people who worked with me in hotels know about my client dossiers, and some of them now have their own teams making them. It’s more than a face sheet; it’s a full brief on who someone is, what they care about, what you actually want to say to them when you’re standing in front of them. But if you only have time for the quick version before you land: pick the people you most want to meet, find their photos, learn two things about each of them, and walk in ready. The goal is to never be caught Googling someone while you’re talking to them.