THE FRENCH-SPEAKING WORLD IS BIGGER THAN YOU THINK

Last November 2025, Pope Leo IX, who is North American, visited Lebanon and gave his speech in French. The French-speaking world is wider than some people think. The influence of French is enormous, far-reaching, and is spoken in places you may not suspect. That crucial fact ought to be taken more seriously, especially in advertising.

I first came to the UK because I was hired by Guinness Brewing Worldwide, as Guinness was known at the time. Their agency, Grandfield Rork Collins, had landed the Africa and Indian Ocean account, and I was in charge of creating radio spots and all their marketing material in French for West Africa and Mauritius. Our relationship lasted 18 years.

I meet numerous nurses from Mauritius in hospitals who are very happy to speak to me in French.

I met a lawyer sitting next to me on the tube. She was reading L’arabe du futur, a best-selling bande dessinée by Riad Satouff, a Franco-Syrian author. She told me she was Algerian and never lived in France but spoke impeccable French.

I met a grocery store manager in New York who started speaking French to me. He was Tunisian, with a law degree, and again, never lived in France.

I watched a France vs Portugal game in an Irish pub in London with Kabile supporters from Marseilles and Algiers. We got together because we were the only France supporters.

My optician is Indian from the South of France. Her family was originally from Goa, who moved to French-speaking Madagascar, then France.

France is the only country that has a territory in every time zone in the world. It is the country with the largest schooling network in the world. How many people have gone to the Lycée français throughout the world, from London (Madonna’s daughter Lourdes), Los Angeles (Jodie Foster) to Madrid (Javier Bardem)?

321 million people speak French in the world. A fairly large chunk of the world population. There are 343 million people in the USA. Imagine spending millions of dollars on advertising and using another language for taglines that hardly anyone understands. That’s what is happening in France and elsewhere, throughout the French-speaking world.

Stop wasting money when you think you’re saving money by using your global tagline in English in French-speaking countries. Always transcreate. People are happier when you speak their language, wherever they live in the world.

Diageo #frenchcopywriting #frenchcopywriter #transcreation #globaladvertising #emea