Some of the most prestigious awards in the advertising industry are being handed out this week in the south of France, at the Cannes International Festival of Creativity.
After a slow start, some Canadians have made the winners stage. Collecting some of the coveted Lion awards helps agencies to promote themselves to prospective and existing clients, and gives bragging rights and bona fides to the lucky creative teams.
Here are the Canadian ads that have been awarded so far.
Major Crimes
Category: Radio
Agency: Blueblancrouge, Montreal
Client: Series+
Award: Bronze Lion
An announcer starts to talk about an investigation show before she is interrupted by the grisly sounds of her own murder. Attention-getting, but also deeply disturbing.
Heart of the Arctic
Category: Cyber
Agency: Cossette, Montreal
Client: Royal Canadian Mint
Award: Bronze Lion
To make coin collecting more appealing to young people, for the 100th anniversary Arctic Expedition series of coins, the Mint decided to create an online game where children acted as Arctic explorers, gathering coins.
The website received more than 50,000 visitors and participation in the school program from 2,375 classrooms.
Just a Reflektor
Category: Cyber
Agency: Google Creative Lab, Data Arts Team, San Francisco and AATOAA, Montreal
Client: Arcade Fire and Google Chrome
Award: Bronze Lion
An interactive music video launched on the website www.justareflektor.com promoted both the Montreal band’s upcoming album at the time, and Google’s web browser, Chrome – the recommended browser to experience the video.
Viewers could hold their mobile phones or tablet devices in front of a computer’s webcam to play with the visual effects in the film by moving their device. The coding of the film was also opened up so that those who wanted to coud play with the effects themselves.
In 2010, the band and Google created another video called “The Wilderness Downtown,” which was also awarded at Cannes.
Christmas Miracle
Category: Cyber
Agency: WestJet internal team
Client: WestJet
Award: Bronze Lion
WestJet wanted to stand out in a crowded advertising season: Christmas. This viral online hit did the job, and then some.
The airline released a video online outlining a holiday stunt: it set up a live “Santa-cam” at airports in Toronto and Hamilton, Ont., where customers could tell the big guy what was on their wish list. WestJet then made those wishes come true, and delivered them in big wrapped boxes at the luggage carousel.
It attracted more than 35-million views on YouTube – 7,000% more than they had targeted. In December, compared to the same month in 2012, revenue was up 86 per cent, bookings rose 77 per cent, and traffic to the website doubled.
Passport Beer Fridge
Category: Design
Agency: Rethink, Vancouver
Client: Molson Canadian
Award: Bronze Lion
Rethink built two beer fridges that could only be opened by scanning a Canadian passport, and then left them in public places in Europe and the U.K. People immediately hunted for Canadians to grant them free beer, and the company turned the whole thing into a commercial reviving its “I. Am. Canadian” tagline.
The fridge then became a celebrity of a kind for Molson – it visited the South By SouthWest festival, the Olympics in Sochi, and other spots. It was featured on Jimmy Kimmel. The company says sales increased.
Staple
Category: Design
Agency: Wax, Calgary
Client: Calgary Society for Persons with Disabilities
Award: Silver Lion
The not-for-profit organization, which provides services for people with disabilities including autism and Down Syndrom, was struggling with funding cuts. So it communicated the struggle of disabilities by making its annual report hard to read. It was stapled in the middle of the page and featured gritty, realistic photos. The organization had its best fundraising year in its 40-year history.
Massey Lectures iPad App
Category: Design
Agency: Critical Mass, Calgary
Client: House of Anansi Press
Award: Silver Lion
To promote the Massey Lectures among a wider audience, and to increase book sales, it was decided that the lectures needed a rebranding. It made the “big ideas” of the authors and the subjects of the lectures more engaging and visual.
The app received wide media coverage.
Calgary Zoo 2012 Annual Report
Category: Design
Agency: Trigger Communications & Design, Calgary
Client: Calgary Zoo
Award: Bronze Lion
The zoo had a record number of visitors in 20120: 1.45-million, many of whom took pictures and posted them to the photo-sharing service Instagram with the label #calgaryzoo. So it decided to make its annual report available on the platform its visitors were already using. Visitor photos were used in the report and the language was simplified.