Cannes Lions: The Pitches, Panels, Parties and Prognostication That Resonated Most During a Scorching Week on the Croisette

The biggest winners this past week at Cannes Lions were undoubtedly … the ice cream vendors.

During a scorching week in the south of France, an estimated 13,000-plus Cannes Lions attendees hustled up and down the Croisette in Cannes for meetings, panels and pitches. The glacier carts and kiosks that dish out ice cream, soft serve and sorbets did brisk business all week. The sweet treats probably added to the general sense of optimism and excitement for the marketing, advertising, data and technology leaders who came to talk shop and compare notes at a time of massive transformation in virtually every business sector.

Related Stories

Dan and Phil on Going Back on Tour After Finally Revealing Their Relationship: 'We Just Want to Go on Stage and Be Completely Ourselves' (EXCLUSIVE)

Jeremy Clarkson Set for More Episodes of ‘Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?’ and ‘Millionaire Hot Seat’

The breadth of Cannes Lions is eye-opening for media and entertainment insiders who get to see and hear how technology and digital disruption are transforming other industries. And at the same time, the business of persuasion is more intertwined with media than ever before – thanks in no small part to the enormous influence of creators. It is no longer just about having a slogan and a catchy commercial jingle. To stay relevant in a social media-wired world, major brands with big consumer profiles have to tell an ongoing story that keeps them in social feeds – and that’s where creators come into play, big-time.

Popular on Variety

The onslaught of AI, the growth of the attention economy and its impact on linear TV viewership have made Cannes Lions a forum for weighty topics in recent years. In the 12 months since the 2025 festival, there has been a palpable shift in attitudes and approaches to tackling disruption. CMOs came to the show with granular examples of how AI, social media, creators, vertical dramas and more have helped them grow and transform. In marketing-speak, the tagline for Cannes Lions 2026 would be something like: “It’s Time to Slay Your Fears, Because the AI-Powered Revolution is Here.”

Gabrielle Wesley, chief marketing officer for Mars Wrigley North America, expressed that spirit during her Variety In the C-Suite conversation held in the Canva Creative Cabana space on the beach.

“One hundred years ago there was just radio. Radio was what kept your attention and then there was the visual with TV, and now we have so many ways to connect with consumers. Consumers have gotten more savvy and more demanding about what they want. They don’t want to be talked to,” Wesley said. “They want to engage. And because they want to engage, it’s like any other relationship. You have to keep having conversations, you have to keep taking them on dates, you’ve got to keep showing them new things and showing them different parts of you. And so I take that very, very seriously to engage with consumers on a two-way relationship, not just message giving.”

Here are a few more takeaways after a 24/7 week at Cannes Lions:

Big Media Courts Creators for Content and Distribution Deals

The trend here couldn’t be clearer in recent months, and it was much on display at Cannes Lions.
The biggest of big media — from Amazon to Fox and Tubi to Netflix — are aggressively courting creators for deals as marketers scramble to tap into the heat around personalities who ply their trade on YouTube, TikTok, Instagram and the like.

The new wrinkle is that the big platforms want to draft off what makes top creators successful in their digital-native realms. In other words, Amazon and Fox don’t want to turn creators into TV stars with new shows exclusive to their platforms. Instead, they want to provide the support services to help creators make more money in their existing realms: YouTube et al, branded live events, endorsements and consumer product launches.

Rob Wade, CEO of Fox Entertainment, was inspired to launch Fox Creator Studios this year after seeing how much commerce Gordon Ramsay was able to generate through his strong social media footprint. Like Fox, Amazon sees potential here and launched its Amazon Creator Services unit last year.

“We saw the way that we could use our content to promote and help grow that business. So all of a sudden, we had all these pieces falling together. It was content, but there were businesses around that content, and although it felt like there was still a lot of gap to bridge between the two worlds, it felt like the right time to me,” Wade told Variety.

Fox’s Tubi unveiled a deal with Amazon’s Fire TV during the festival that will make Tubi’s selection of creator content easily accessible and searchable on the platform.

“Foundationally, it’s about bringing customers the content they want and helping creators have another surface to get their content in front of customers,” said Charlotte Maines, VP of devices content and advertising for Amazon.

Tubi, Fox’s ad-supported streaming platform that reaches more than 100 million users, has become a haven for monetization for creators. It works because Tubi does not insist on exclusivity – quite the contrary.

“If you look at the way that distribution has grown as the internet came up, … it’s really about access and it’s really about no gating, no paywalls, and putting our users first,” said Rachel Berk, senior VP of platform partnerships for Tubi and Fox. “I fully anticipate things to get more creative, both on my the deal side, the platform side, and the create and the creator side, but I also expect them to get even more sophisticated, even more accessible, where we’re really being able to, your point about search and discover, we would really be being able to highlight and platform different kinds of voices and address the needs of our very diverse users.”

What Is Barbie Doing in Coachella?

Mattel staged an activation for Barbie — the toy icon who is now 67 years young — at this year’s Coachella music festival in Indio, California. Roberto Stanichi, Mattel’s chief global brand officer, said data compiled by the company shows Barbie was the music festival’s most talked-about brand. “You would say, like, ‘What is Barbie doing in Coachella?” he said at the Variety in the C-Suite in collaboration with Canva beachfront speaker series. At Coachella, “the Gen Z audience there was so incredibly impacted by the fact that you had this Barbie presence,” Stanichi said.

The line for the Barbie activation at the festival at one point was three and a half hours long. “So you would think about, why does this resonate so much with that audience and it was surprising?” Stanichi said. Undoubtedly helping punch Barbie into the Gen Z zeitgeist was Greta Gerwig’s 2023 “Barbie” blockbuster, which took in $1.45 billion globally at the box office. (He didn’t have an update on plans for a sequel.)