The Hindu Business Line : Abby awards

Ogilvy & Mather (O&M) and its men and women in black swept the race for metal and crowned themselves as the Creative Agency of the Year for the sixth, or was it seventh, er ... might be eighth, time. Quite frankly, we've lost count. Don't get us wrong. O&M had some good work that deserved to win and we congratulate it heartily. Yet with a dozen or so big agencies staying away from the Abby awards (we reported on this last week) the entire evening consisted of black and shades of Grey. Yes, Grey Worldwide cantered in at second place and Nirvik Singh couldn't stop smiling.

Of course, let's first raise a toast to Piyush Pandey and his merry team. We fear Pandeyji will soon want to emulate Lata Mangeshkar and say that he will not enter in any award. Bite my tongue. That would be disastrous for the Advertising Club which is subsisting on the money it gets from entries from O&M and a couple of other agencies (just kidding), and for Pandeyji who loves entering in every award in the world except the one hosted by the Advertising Agencies Association of India (AAAI) (not kidding).

Abby Nite

The AdClub Bombay decided to take the fact that so many agencies had not entered in a lighter vein. So light, they called a couple of stand-up comics to do the honours on stage. Well, awards are becoming a laughing matter these days, so we guess the venerable Ad Club had its finger on the pulse of the industry. Anyway, the crowd that attended the function consisted of large groups from a few agencies and a motley gang of processors, studios and the like.

And the awards ...

And the awards went to O&M, Grey and Everest (in that order). No surprises that we did not recognise all the agencies in the top ten (not that we know every agency in India). Weighing in at number six, with one gold, was an agency called `A'. We congratulate it and are sure we will be hearing a lot about it in the days to come. At number seven was Percept, with one silver and three `finalist', whatever that means. And it might embarrass it but in the proper spirit of things we must mention that FCB Ulka made the top ten, coming in at No. 10. It got one silver, for Zee Cinema, in the media section. Oh, just to put things in perspective for all those number-crunching nerds, there were 32 golds, 87 silvers, 85 `finalists' and two special golds.

O&M won 20 golds, 47 silvers, 47 finalists and two special golds.

Ouch!

Over to the Goafest!

Goa Ho!

With the Abby awards history now (we obviously mean this year's awards) all eyes are focused on the Goafest of the AAAI. The Advertising Agencies Association of India seems to be pulling out all the stops to make its function memorable. One thing is certain, we will have a closer fight there. Maybe we will get lucky and get an invite to the Goafest. Then we would bring you a beachside view of the proceedings.

Laadli Awards

Bobby Sista

This is an original. You've heard of all the awards there are. Now, veteran ad man Bobby Sista and his Laadli created one more. A gender sensitivity award for agencies and the media. Timed to perfection a couple of days before International Women's Day, Bobby certainly pulled a bunny from his hat. He got the Lokasatta daily, the Maharashtra Government and a wing of the UN to get involved. He had Keshub Mahindra, Lara Datta, Govind Nihalani, Kiron Kher and advertising types such as Mohammed Khan and Ramesh Narayan to present the awards and generally pulled in a surprisingly large crowd at the Tata Theatre in Nariman Point. Well, anything for a good cause, we guess. Oh, O&M won an award there as well. Congrats!

Victoria invites comments at brandline@thehindu.co.in

Victoria

More Stories on : Advertising | Mumbai Mosaic

Article E-Mail :: Comment :: Syndication :: Printer Friendly Page

Stories in this Section
Execution. What it is?

Abby awards

The North-South Internet divide

Interactive brands

Growth under pressure

Motoring ahead

Can Pond's work a miracle?

Consumers are the new creative department