South Africa, June 3 -- That was L'Orealistar: House of Creatives. And it might be the clearest signal yet that the most important shift in African marketing is coming from a completely different way of thinking about who creators are.

Three weeks from now, the world's biggest advertising festival opens in Cannes with an entire programme built around exactly this idea. The gap between what happened in Sandton and what's being debated on the French Riviera is where this article lives.

In 2023, Goldman Sachs estimated the creator economy at $250 billion, climbing to $480bn by 2027, prompting Cannes Lions to launch its official creator track, Lions Creators.

But the signal that matters most from Cannes 2026 isn't the programme, it's the n...