Point Of Sale is where the rubber meets the road in advertising terms.

Everywhere else is just vague ‘awareness’ or ‘brand building’.

This is the one time you get to talk to someone at the exact point where you can make them part with their money.

Two examples.

Oxford is a beautiful university town.

Right in the centre, amongst all the ancient colleges are several off-licences.

One particular off-licence has a blackboard outside.

On it are the names of the different colleges.

Next to each college’s name is the number of cases of beer they’ve bought.

How brilliant is that?

Oxford is one of the best universities in the world.

 To get in, you have to be more than just good.

You have to be really competitive.

You have to want to win at absolutely everything.

Consequently, even if it’s a competition to see which college can drink more beer, you want your college to beat the others.

So, if you’re a student at Oxford, where are you going to buy your beer?

Right, at the place where your case of beer represents another point for your college.

And it’s irresistible, because it’s on show to everyone in the town.

Hampstead is also a beautiful place.

It’s full of cultured, well-off, upmarket types.

At the weekend you can see them sipping espressos outside the cafes.

You can also see the onion-seller in his beret.

Wheeling his bike around with strings of onions hanging from the handle-bars.

They cost a bit more than ordinary onions, but who can resist real French onions bought from a real French onion seller?

What you don’t see is that when he’s sold all the onions on his bike, he pushes it around the corner to his van, and loads it up again.

Then at the end of the day, when he’s sold all his onions, he puts the bike in the van and drives off.

The off-licence and the onion seller.

That’s creative POS.