The World’s best communications as measured by the quantity and quality of awards won plus comment and analysis

• Search

 

• 

This year there were nearly 3,300 shortlisted and award-winning campaigns at Cannes and we logged the details of every single one of them – and the 22,000 people behind them. And then we put them into lists.

The main stories are: the UK is doing a lot of soul-searching at the moment as to why it’s not the creative powerhouse it used to be. Well, the country hasn’t become completely useless as Britain ranks No.2 behind, surprisingly, the USA. This is because of the rise and rise of digital.
The other big question is, what is happening in Belgium? The little country has done disproportionately well this year, with brilliant work across all media. It is Europe’s answer to New Zealand, with ideas that are integrated and off the wall.

Check out your own ranking and your agency’s rankings here. And see how they have changed in a month or so after we have entered all the details of the upcoming awards shows around the world into

The Big Won database

Want to know who the top creative director in the world is?
Want to know who the top copywriter is?
Want to know if you are the top art director?
Want to know who the top account man is? (It could be a woman)?
What’s the top country?

For the answers, click here

| View other posts in General | Leave a Comment 

Here we are in the grip of a recession and though the numbers are down at the Cannes Advertising festival this year, you would be pushed to believe it judging by the crowds in the usual bars and restaurants.

It has made a fairly easy target for a couple of big guns recently. Bob Garfield wrote in Ad Age that Cannes doesn’t matter any more and Jeff Goodby wrote a much-forwarded piece suggesting that advertising awards are now about creativity for the sake of creativity rather than about imaginative solutions to business problems.

The Big Won caught up with Graham Fink, ECD of M&C Saatchi London and an ex-President of D&AD and with Phil Thomas, CEO of the Cannes Advertising Festival and asked them for their opinions. To see what they think, watch the video.

 

Fiat – a Cyber Grand Prix winner for AKQA London

 

Wrangler – Press Grand Prix for Fred & Farid, Paris

Axion – several Golds in Direct and Cyber for Boondoggle, Belgium

 

video was streamed to you courtesy of Groovy Gecko.

| View other posts in General | Leave a Comment 

Steve Aldridge is one of the Direct jurors here and is going back to London with a request to his Finance Director to quadruple his awards budget for next year.

The same piece of work can now be entered in several different media types, let alone in several different categories.

It means, if you have a great bit of work like Shackleton’s “The Village where nothing ever happens” you can win multiple golds across Promo, Direct and/or PR.

 

“The Store that Sells Hope” for the Portuguese Red Cross was a multiple winner as was “Let It Ring” from Happiness, Brussels.

Click to view full size

So, you can be disappointed in one media form but find happiness in another. Proximity London had high hopes for RNLI in Direct, but it barely scratched the surface, yet hurrah hurrah it won a Silver in Media.

Convergence is getting confusing and expensive.

Look at the PR Grand Prix, Best Job in the World for the Queensland Tourism Board from CumminsNitro Brisbane. It was also the Grand Prix in Direct. Probably the only reason it didn’t win Gold in Promo was because they didn’t enter it.

Click to view full size

As Pablo Alzugaray, CEO of Shackleton, and the top agency for Direct at the Festival, said once, in Cannes you get the opportunity to buy several different juries for your work.

Not cheap but it will help them to a 3^rd successive year at the top of The Won Report, no doubt.

Among the Promo Lions, Zuji Beans from Happy Soldiers, Sydney, was a shoo-in.

Click to view full size

The Magic salad Plate from Clemenger BBDO Australia got a huge laugh in the auditorium when it was shown on Monday night.

 

Click to view full size

But a personal favourite was Proximity BBDO Belgium’s “Baby Made On Board” campaign for the Dodge Journey. To demonstrate how much space it had in the back, they invited couples to come and have a bonk in the boot. Any couple who had a baby exactly nine months later would get a Dodge free.

Click to view full size

 

In Direct, the big cheer of the night went to “Axion Banner Concerts” from Boondoggle Leuven, also in Belgium.

As Steve Aldridge also noted, “What’s with Belgium this year?” It’s a little country with a great big stack of metal so far.

A big favourite at The Big Won since it won Gold at EPICA is “Car Dance Party” for Toyota by Happiness Brussels, who must be ecstatic.

 

JWT Japan won the Grand Prix for Kit-Kat.

Hmmm. Not the people’s choice judging from some of the muttering in the Palais. More mutterings because the radio jury were tight with the gongs this year. A Grand Prix for NetworkBBDO Johannesburg for Virgin Atlantic, a Gold for the National Thoroughbred Racing Association from Devito/Verdi, New York, two silvers and five bronzes.

It would have been a short presentation ceremony.

More to shout about at the Outdoor awards where TBWA Hunt Lascaris won the Grand Prix with a campaign for The Zimbabwean newspaper, the posters printed on worthless Zimbabwean bank-notes because “it’s cheaper than paper”.

More to come later in the week.

video was streamed to you courtesy of Groovy Gecko.

| View other posts in General | Leave a Comment 

Yesterday, June 15th, England were knocked out of the 20/20 Cricket World Cup by the West Indies. Yet another sport the Brits invented at which they are no longer any good. Coming up is Wimbledon, last won by a male Brit in 1936. Rugby – Argentina beat England on Saturday. Football – England’s last success was in 1966.

It’s the same in advertising and design.

In the 70’s, 80’s and even the 90’s Britain was a creative powerhouse. Now it’s not. Further proof of this was to be seen at D&AD on Thursday June 11^th when only three advertising awards went to London agencies.

Mother won a yellow pencil for Orange.

DDB London won a pencil for Harvey Nicholls Bristol

BBH won a pencil for Barnardo’s.

 

In the design section, it is just about possible to claim a UK success for the amazing DRL Pavilion designed by Alan Dempsey and Alvin Huang for the Architectural Association.

Alan Dempsey and Alvin Huang

Alan Dempsey and Alvin Huang

 

And a big hurrah for Christopher Doyle’s Identity Guidelines.

 

View the full PDF

Otherwise D&AD was a good night for the Japanese, Bascule leading the way with “12 Cams, Create your Own Rainbow” for Radiohead. Dentsu’s brand-building mobile game for Honda is intriguing too.

Good stuff from Australia as well. Respect for M&C Saatchi’s “Throw Us A Bone” campaign for the Sydney Cats and Dogs Home. And Saatchi & Saatchi’s UN Voices Project “Talking Posters” idea is going to be much imitated in the year ahead. BMF Sydney’s brown bag idea for Toohey’s continues to win awards and will, no doubt, feature in The Big Won’s lists of top ideas in 2009.

M&C’s Throw Us A Bone 

The USA made its mark with Droga5’s two black pencils – for The Great Schlep for Obama and for the Million Project.

The Great Schlep for Obama 

Million Project 

Exactly why the UK is on the slide is the subject for a longer piece which we’ll put together for you after Cannes. We’ll be there with our cameras and will be reporting daily.

video was streamed to you courtesy of Groovy Gecko.

| View other posts in General | Leave a Comment 

There have been a number of shows in South America in the last month.

There was the Festival Iberoamericano de la Publicidad, alias FIAP, in mid-May; the Wave Festival at the Copacabana Palace in Rio and, at the end of the month, El Sol festival in San Sebastian in Spain for advertising around the world that’s in Spanish or Portuguese.

Our Spanish is not very good here at The Big Won, so we aren’t sure about this, but we think “Greenpeace Weather” won a Gold at FIAP for Almap BBDO.

It is an online game which rewards players who collaborate to save the planet. It is also available offline as a good old-fashioned board game but unlike Risk and Monopoly etc, which teach players strategies of power and domination, Weather is all about caring and sharing.

Could be a contender at Cannes. 

Meanwhile, over in the TV categories, JWT Argentina have been winning awards of different hue for their Ford work. At FIAP the Ka campaign won Bronze but Silver at Wave.

 

Gold at FIAP for Almap BBDO with “GreenPeace Weather”

 
JWT Argentina’s  Ford Ka campaign 

video was streamed to you courtesy of Groovy Gecko.

| View other posts in General | Leave a Comment 

What makes Cannes such a great festival? Well, the beach and the sun have quite a lot to do with it.

So the organisers of South America’s second Wave Festival went for the same magical combo – on Copacabana Beach in Rio.

Between May 11^th and May 13^th, around 500 of the finest admen and adwomen of the region gathered to celebrate the 161 winners.

Almap BBDO emerged as agency of the year, winning, among its 19 prizes, the Blue Wave for Best Integrated campaign.

This was for Coca-Cola and was an idea about that old chestnut, “Who is the greatest football player ever?” Is it Argentina’s Maradona? Or is it  Brazil’s Biro Biro?

Biro Who?????

Exactly.

The suggestion is that even one of Brazil’s lesser stars is as good as anything from next door.

TV, press ads and girls on the streets all asked people to take sides – using Coke bottle tops to vote.

 

Elsewhere in the festival, Almap BBDO were print winners with a campaign for Gatorade.

The TV Grand Prix went to F/Nazca Brazil with a spot for private medical insurance company Unimed, pointing out that more people have died in modern times from smoking than from warfare.

 
Good to see real brands that spend real money on advertising winning the awards. By contrast, though, the Outdoor Grand Prix went to DM9DDB for a series of posters for Saxsofunny, a recording studio in Sao Paulo. The idea is that the posters make sounds. One rustles like a fire; with another, pop the bubble wrap and it sounds like a typewriter; and shake the third and it sounds like thunder.

Nice. But we can’t help feeling here it’s more a campaign designed to showcase the agency’s talents than to showcase the studio’s. 

video was streamed to you courtesy of Groovy Gecko. 

| View other posts in General | Leave a Comment 

Agencies aren’t really very important to clients at the moment but I suspect that is about to change as brands begin to lose their value shockingly.

Brand owners have abused the trust consumers have given them in the pursuit of more profits for less value.

Nestle put melanin in their powdered milk. It’s a poison. Cadbury knew salmonella was in their chocolate but left it on the shelves for three months.

The Ford Explorer crashed, Firestone made tyres which they knew burst at high speeds. The banks have wilfully cheated us.

Their role models, of course, have been Presidents and Prime Ministers. “I did not have sex with that woman”, said one. “I have proof of weapons of mass destruction,” said another.

This idea from Droga5 won a Grand Clio at the Clio Awards on Thursday (May 14^th) and is one of the more important ideas of the year so far.

Million reconnects brands with ethics and with the needs of real people in real difficulties. It may well provide a template for communications to come, with brands seeking to engage with people on a more human level. Brands that don’t learn to give will become worthless.

Companies are having to change how they do business. And in helping them reorganise themselves as well as in how to relate better to the people they are supposed to serve, agencies may well find their own salvation.

Here’s the story of The Million Project.

The problem:

There are over one million students in the New York City public school system.

37% will never graduate.

 

The brief:

Inspire kids to engage at school. Make academic achievement desirable, tangible and rewarding.

 

The insight:

The most powerful way to reach students is to connect with them the same way they connect with each other.

 

The solution:

The Million project.

Samsung, Verizon and the NYC Department of Education all came together to design and give students a free mobile phone. But a phone with a difference. The Million phone rewards students for everything they do in school with everything that interests them out of school.

During school hours the phone (a Samsung U740) delivers educational messages and help with homework. The more you achieve at school, the more credits you get to use the phone out of school hours.

You get free talktime, free texts, music downloads, movie tickets, store discounts…

Results:

On February 27^th, the Million programme was launched in New York and within weeks teachers were recording improvements in participation and grades.

Rollout continues in schools across NYC. Now schools in Houston, Chicago and New Mexico have expressed interest in having the Million Project in their schools.

The website is: http://www.millionnyc.com

video was streamed to you courtesy of Groovy Gecko.

| View other posts in General | Leave a Comment 

I’ve been wanting to write about this hijacking of “Gerry McGuire” for several weeks, ever since I was a judge of the AnPost Irish direct marketing awards.

I loved the idea so much I rang up the agency to find out more about them.

Strategem Ireland’s a small integrated agency in Ireland run by a great guy called Keith Lee. He is also the star of the movies, thanks to a bit of green screen trickery.

The first film, “You had me at hello” was mailed out to 15 prospective new clients. 13 rang up to say, yes, let’s meet.

And last week, when the agency won three Golds and a fistful of silvers at the awards do, they ran the follow-up, “Titanic”, at the show.

Standing ovation.

Most agencies really don’t know how to do self-promotion. Strategem, with self-deprecation and a great sense of humour, can show a lot of bigger shops how to do it.

Result: Keith sees “the money”  

 

Another self-promo that didn’t sink 

video was streamed to you courtesy of Groovy Gecko.

 

 

| View other posts in General | Leave a Comment 

He calls himself Simontsmall and he’s an Ozzie strategist who is said to be the brains behind the work from Kiwi vodka brand 42 Below. And the work has been not only hilarious but bloody effective.

Now it seems that 42 Below has handed its account to a UK shop. Simontsmall has not taken this lying down – and good on him.

He has posted a viral in which he has a pop at poncy London new media agencies “who invent more new words than they can fit in their tiny banners.”

Inadvertently he’s sparked off a debate about London’s place in the advertising firmament.

Is it still the capital of creativity?

Unfortunately (if you’re a Brit) no. And measurably no. Because that’s what we’ve been doing here at The Big Won for the last three and a half years, counting up who’s won the most awards.

(Yeah, we’re sad people. But the information’s quite interesting.)

 

Top countries 2008 Position in 2007
 

1. Germany 2

2. USA 1

3. UK 3

4. Spain 6

5. Argentina 5

6. Brazil 4

7. Australia 11

8. France 8

9. Sweden 10

10. New Zealand 14

 

If you look at the rankings by media discipline, in 2008 the best the UK could do was No.2 for TV and No.2 for posters. 3^rd for Digital, 6^th for DM.

Lean Mean Fighting Machine came in at No.8 in Digital, a better showing than the UK’s top placed digital agency in 2007, Glue, which was 16^th.

You have to go back to 2006 to find a UK agency topping any of the rankings – Mother was the No.1 TV agency in the world that year.

Looking at 2009, in Alternative and Innovative Media, which you’d imagine is where the future of the business is taking shape, the No.1 agency so far is Japan, and No.2 is China. Germany is No.3 and the UK is No.6.

 

Simontsmall really does have a point.

 

And United Arab Emirates plummets

In the 2009 rankings to date, what with two big regional shows in the Middle East, FP7 Doha had been doing rather well.

But it turns out that all their winning ads were scam. The agency’s parent company, Fortune Promoseven, has taken the bold step of returning all the awards FP7 won at the Dubai Lynxes.

This has had an effect on the Big Won rankings. Put another way, FP7 is no longer the No.2 agency in the world.

 

The new listings for 2009 are:

 

Top agencies by total creativity to May 7^th
 

1. AIM Proximity Auckland NZ

2. Leo Burnett Beirut

3. Starcom Mediavest UAE

4. Memac Ogilvy Dubai

5. Y&R France

6. JWT Shanghai

7. BMF Sydney

8. JWT Dubai

9. DDB London

10. JWT Beirut

 

Top DM agencies to May 7^th
 

1. AIM Proximity Auckland NZ

2. BMF Sydney

3. Shackleton Madrid

4. Proximity London

5. Rapp New Zealand

6. Clemenger BBDO Sydney

7. M&C Saatchi Melbourne

8. JWT Dubai

9. OgilvyOne Frankfurt

10. Clemenger Proximity Melbourne

 

Top press agencies to May 7^th
 

1. Y&R France

2. CLM BBDO Boulogne-Billancourt

3, Grey Beijing

4. JWT Shanghai

5. Saatchi & Saatchi Malaysia

6. Leo Burnett Mumbai

7. Saatchi & Saatchi Bangkok

8. FP7 Doha*

9. Leo Burnett Kuala Lumpur

10. DDB London

 

FP7 still has awards credited at Mena Cristal and other awards shows)

 

Top TV agencies to May 7th
1. Saatchi & Saatchi New York

2. DDB London

3. George Patterson Y&R Sydney

4. Leo Burnett Beirut

5. Ogilvy & Mather Taiwan

6. Publicis & Hal Riney, San Francisco

7. Ogilvy & Mather Bangkok

8. Goodby Silverstein San Francisco

9. Fortune Promoseven Egypt

10. RKCR Y&R London

 

 

Top countries to May 7^th

 

1. Germany

2. United Arab Emirates

3. UK

4. USA

5. Australia

6. Japan

7. China

8. New Zealand

9. Thailand

10. Lebanon
 

video was streamed to you courtesy of Groovy Gecko.

| View other posts in General | Leave a Comment 

 

It was the CAANZ Axis awards a couple of weeks ago. The best of Kiwi creativity honoured – with a trophy that looks strangely like a metronome.

New Zealand punches way above its weight in the world probably because the lines of communication between creative and client are shorter. There isn’t layer upon layer of spineless jobsworths to get in the way.

Also there’s a ‘give it a go’ attitude that runs through all New Zealanders and which you can see in their advertising – at ww.caanz.co.nz. Click on Awards, then on Axis.

Grand Axis of Innovation went to TBWA\Whybin Tequila for an idea for Preventing Violence New Zealand. If you need a helpline number to call should your partner come home intent on beating you up, you can hardly stick it up on the door. As Liz McAneny of the Ministry of Social Development pointed out, “It is ironic and awful if a pamphlet or card with information about a helpline turns out to be the cause of a woman getting assaulted if their partner finds it.”

The agency came up with barcode stickers, which can be stuck onto boxes, magazines, cartons without raising the faintest suspicion.

The stickers have been given to doctors and social workers to give to victims of assault. They, in their turn, report “an unprecedented acceptance of helpline details” because they are now so covert.

A Silver in Direct Marketing went to DraftFCB for their campaign for Oktober, a post-production company that promises to take even the crappiest commercial and make it look good. What did they mail creative directors? A golden turd.

More noticeable on the shelf than a metronome, anyway.

Doesn’t look like a helpline number. But it is.

Wouldn’t you just love one on your shelf?

| View other posts in General | Leave a Comment 

Next Page →

• Subscribe to the The Big Won RSS Feed

-->

Advertisement

•