Yesterday, (May 13) the winners of the Festival of Media Global Awards 2015 were announced. The FMG Awards, which took place in Rome earlier this week, is arguably the most influential media industry event in the world, so it was quite a coup for the UK to bring home 10 awards in total, including an impressive five golds. The gold awards were claimed by Ford Mustang: “The Road Awaits” (Blue Hive), Virgin Holidays: “Virtual Holidays” (Manning Gottlieb OMD), Intel: “Intel Your World” (OMD), H&M: “The Box of Wang” (UM) and Xbox: “Glitch – The Longest / Shortest Ad Ever” (UM International). Over 50 of the world’s leading brands were rewarded for their work, with gold trophies picked up by eight countries around the globe. Having not won any gold awards at all in the 2014 Festival of Media Global Awards, the USA topped the country winners list with a grand total of 15 trophies. Australia took second place with 12 awards, with the UK coming in third.
The winners of the Festival of Media Global Awards 2015 were announced yesterday
The Australian “Penny the Pirate” campaign from optical brand Luxottica (OMD / M2M) was named the clear winner in the awards, picking up four golds and the highly coveted “Campaign of the Year” trophy. On the agency side, Starcom MediaVest Group claimed “Agency of the Year” after taking home eight trophies (four gold, two silver and two bronze), including three golds for the Always #likeagirl campaign (P&G). The “Agency Network of the Year” prize, meanwhile, was taken by OMD, who won by a clear margin across multiple campaigns, brands and offices, including a strong performance from their UK agency.
The final jury which deliberated each of the 24 categories during the Festival was made up of leading industry minds from around the world, and in order to champion diversity (a hot topic among this year’s festival speakers) the juries featured the highest ever ratio of female to male participants, with a 40:60 split. Alongside the awards, this year’s Festival also focused on how media is driving, colliding and influencing other business sectors, while providing insight into the industry’s most pertinent topics. The event attracts the biggest gathering of brands and forward-thinking media leaders from over 41 different countries, making the event a truly global meeting of media talent and inspiring leaders.
The UK brought home 10 awards in total, including an impressive five golds
Charlie Crowe, Chairman and Editor-in-Chief at C Squared, the festival's hosts and the international media and marketing industry's fastest growing publishing and events business, said: “We are really trying to develop our awards categories to not only reflect the changes taking place in media but also to challenge the industry to push new boundaries. And guess what? The industry has responded! In nine years and across 19 Festival of Media shows since we launched, we have never seen more award entries of such high quality, as well as a 20 per cent increase in entries overall. We have a duty to ensure this work is shared globally, to inspire even greater heights for next year . There were at least five occasions in the jury rooms where the arguments were over whether multiple gold awards should be given. We have a duty to ensure this work is shared globally, to inspire even greater heights for next year.”
Chris Carmichael, Global Head of Media at HSBC, said: “I was incredibly impressed by the high quality of entries. In some cases, there were five or six entries in each category which had the potential to win gold, leading to some heated discussions and tough decisions during the voting in order to decide the final winner. Jon Suarez-Davis, VP, Global Media & Digital Strategy at Kellogg Company, added: “The mix of media agencies, advertisers, plus, for the first time, the addition of media owners and ad tech companies in the jury made for a dynamic debate and how seeing such great work will go on to inspire our own media decisions.”
