Six signatures for a post

Valentine's Day falls on Friday, and in some building this week a photograph of two coffee cups is going round for the fourth time.

The post itself is free. That is why it exists. Somebody said we should do something for the fourteenth, nobody could argue with doing something, and something is one image, one line and an hour of a designer's afternoon.

Then it enters the chain.

The brand person, the marketing manager, the head of marketing, legal on the wording, the country office who will say it does not work in their market, and the founder, who has a view on the shade of red. Six people, each with a weekend somewhere in the week and a queue of other work.

That is the same six who approve a year of media. The chain has one speed, and it does not know the difference between a post that runs for an afternoon and a plan that runs until December.

Look at the cost per day of life. The annual plan is decided once and works for twelve months. The Friday post is decided once and works for a few hours. Identical toll, booked nowhere, because approval is paid in other people's hours and those arrive free.

The team notices long before the finance system does. Small things turn out to be expensive, so people stop proposing them. What survives is four large campaigns a year and a calendar of days handled late, flattened, with the best line taken out on Thursday night.

The answer is not a faster chain. It is a shorter one for small days: one person who can say yes on the day, a limit they cannot cross, no route upwards. Or leave the day alone and let it pass.

Deciding a one-day post at the price of a year-long plan is the only option nobody can afford, and it is the one almost every company picks.