O&M Agency of the Year at Ad Club Kolkata Creative Excellence Awards

The 53-year-old Advertising Club Kolkata revived its Creative Excellence Awards in a glittering event on February 10 in Kolkata; the awards have not been given since 2003. O&M, Kolkata, bagged the Agency of the Year award.

Speaking to agencyfaqs!, Sidhartha Roy, vice-president, Advertising Club of Kolkata, says, “We were the first to introduce creative awards in India – the other ad club awards followed us. In 2003, we decided to introduce the Consumer Connect Awards, instead of the creative ones, because we felt that it was more important to highlight the strategies used in a brand communication.”

However, this year, the Advertising Club of Kolkata felt that apart from strategies, it was also extremely important to honour the creative aspect of the brand communication. That’s why it decided to revive the old Creative Excellence Awards, which were called off in 2003.

The Consumer Connect Awards are given to those agencies whose adverts leave an impression on the consumer. The Advertising Club of Kolkata conducts research that reveals the challenges faced by the brand. It also shows how the advertising agency addressed the challenges and the kind of media and non-media solutions that were implemented for the brand. Finally, the research also takes into consideration the opinion of the consumers.

Roy adds, “The Consumer Connect Awards will follow in the latter part of the year. This year, invitations were also sent to agencies in Nepal and Bangladesh to take part in the award procedure.”

The Creative Excellence Awards had 14 broad categories, out of which the Advertising Club received entries for seven categories.

Ogilvy & Mather, Kolkata, bagged nine awards, including in the sub-categories. These include Retail: Single Print Ad (winner and runner up), Retail: Radio (winner), Retail: Outdoor (winner), Retail: POP (runner up), Retail: Campaign (winner), Consumer Services: Single Print Ad (runner up), Consumer Services: Outdoor (winner) and Consumer Services: Campaign (runner up).

Bates, Kolkata, also bagged nine awards for the categories, Cards and Invitation (winner and runner up), Public Service: Single TVC (runner up), Retail: POP (runner up), Retail: Campaign (runner up), Consumer Services: Single Print Ad Less than 60 cc (winner), Consumer Services: Single Print Ad More than 60 cc (runner up), Consumer Product FMCG: Single Print Ad More than 60 cc (winner and runner up) and Consumer Product FMCG: Campaign (runner up).

Response India won seven awards in the categories, while JWT picked up two awards for Consumer Services: POP (winner) and Consumer Durables: Campaign (runner up).

WYSIWYG Communications bagged both the winner and runner’s up award in the Folders and Brochures category. Radio Mirchi picked up the runner’s up trophy in the Consumer Services: Retail category.

This year, the panel of judges included Kiran Khalap, Victor Banerjee and Ram Ray.

To conclude, Roy says, “We received around 350 entries from West Bengal, Orissa, Bihar, Jharkhand, Mumbai, Bangladesh and Nepal.”

© 2006 agencyfaqs!