Effie 2003: 16 Finalists announced; O&M, Lowe lead in nominations

Following two rounds of intensive judging, the Finalists for this year's Effie Awards - distributed for effectiveness in advertising and communication - have been announced. In all, 16 case studies have been selected for the Finals, and these case studies would be presented to the audience on the afternoon of Friday, August 22, at the Ballroom, Hotel Taj Land's End, Bandra. The award ceremony is slated for later the same evening.

It may be recalled that last week, 25 shortlisted case studies came up for judging in Round Two, and a jury that included advertising and marketing personalities such as Rajiv Agarwal, Niteen Bhagwat, Mukul Deoras, Ravi Deshpande, Bharat Dhabolkar, Ramesh Iyengar, Prasoon Joshi, Deepa Kakkar, Kiran Khalap, Shyam Motwani, Pradeep Poddar and Arvind Sharma judged the shortlisted entries in three categories - Consumer Products, Consumer Durables and Services. The 16 Finalists have been selected from the 25 shortlisted case studies.

The brands/case studies that have made it to the Finalist stage are Coca-Cola, Lifebuoy, Center Shock, Tide, Mint-O, Sprite (all in Consumer Products), Daikin, Asian Paints Exterior Emulsions, LG Golden Eye, Tata Indigo, Scorpio (all in Consumer Durables), Pulse Polio Immunization Programme, Prudential ICICI Mutual Fund, ICICI Prudential Life Insurance, Balbir Pasha/PSI and Max/Sony (all in Services). The shortlisted brands that failed to make it as Finalists are: Lipton Ice Tea, Babool, Sugarfree, Bajaj Pulsar, Enticer, Indica V2, Hutch, Wipro Technologies and Lifebuoy (Lifebuoy had two entries in the shortlist, but only one entry made it into the Finals).

One look at the array of brands in the Finals shows that O&M and Lowe have good reason to feel flattered. Of the 16 Finalists, these two agencies account for nine case studies. While O&M's entries are Center Shock, Sprite, Asian Paints Exterior Emulsions, Pulse Polio Immunization Programme and Prudential ICICI Mutual Fund, Lowe's entries are Lifebuoy, LG Golden Eye, ICICI Prudential Life Insurance and Balbir Pasha/PSI. Interestingly, all of Lowe's entries that figured the shortlist have made it to the Finals. O&M, on the other hand, had seven entries in the shortlist, but only five managed reaching the Finals.

FCB-Ulka is the only other agency which has more than one Finalist nomination - its entries being Tata Indigo and Mint-O. McCann-Erickson India (Coca-Cola), Euro RSCG (Max), Rediffusion DY&R (Daikin), Interface (Scorpio) and Leo Burnett India (Tide) are the other agencies that have a stake in Friday's Finals.

Eight advertising agencies and 15 advertisers. That's the number of organisations that stand a realistic chance of carting away metals - and the metal of metals, the Grand Effie - on the evening of August 22. And, of course, there is the People's Choice Trophy (a popular award, decided by the audience at the final presentation), a tribute to the best case study/presentation from industry peers.

The afternoon and evening of Friday promises quite some bit of action from client-agency teams. What remains to be seen is who is left standing at the end of it all. © 2003 agencyfaqs!