SA's D&AD 2017 winners: TBWA Hunt Lascaris
International advertising award season is underway, with the One Show taking place in New York next week and the Cannes Lions next month. South Africa is off to a good start, having brought home 13 Pencils from 732 in total at the 55th annual D&AD Awards, which ranked us in 13th country spot.
Here Glover, also D&AD 2017 jury president for radio and audio, specifically talks us through this year’s wins for the agency, their previous D&AD ‘pencil box’ record and their strategy to keep those international accolades coming…
We got three pencils this year. The first was a graphite pencil in radio and audio for the Flight Centre Student Flights ‘US president’ spot, produced by Louis Enslin of Produce Sound. This was a tactical idea done just before the US elections and paints a bleak picture of America in a specific post-election scenario. The thinking was that given the unpredictability of world events, it’s certainly wise to travel sooner rather than later. Of course, we never imagined it would actually happen.
Congratulations! Talk us through this year’s wins for the agency.
Then we picked up two wood pencils in the ‘writing for radio and audio’ category, which is judged by a specialised jury of international writers. One was for Flight Centre Student Flights’ ‘Spirit Fest,’ also produced by Louis Enslin of Produce Sound, and another for City Lodge Hotels’ ‘Anniversary,’ produced by Lorens Persson of Sterling Sound.
I was lucky enough to be president of the radio and audio jury this year and was part of the Black Pencil judging across all advertising categories. This experience really put the wins into perspective for me. It is incredibly difficult to even make it onto a shortlist at D&AD, let alone to actually pick up a pencil. I’ve judged at all the international shows and this is by far the toughest and most brutal. The judges expect absolute perfection and only award pencils for work of the highest standard, so to win one graphite and two wood pencils is a massive achievement as it puts us at the top performing individual agency in SA.
As a country, we can be very proud of the quality of our ideas, writers and our world-class audio engineers. Well done to all the South African pencil winners. You’ve essentially bagged yourselves a unicorn!
What was your previous D&AD ‘pencil box’ record?
Last year was a really good year for TBWA Hunt Lascaris, with one yellow and two wood pencils. But the best year we had was 2010, when we picked up four wood pencils, two yellow and one black for ‘The Zimbabwean’.
The value of a pencil
Damon Stapleton 22 Feb 2017
Share your strategy to keep those international accolades coming.
The strategy is simply to keep our heads down, have some fun and continue to do the best work for our clients. Awards are most often a natural byproduct of that process.
Sound advice. Here’s hoping for much more of that great South African work to come. Click here for a reminder of all of South Africa’s 2017 D&AD Pencil winners.
About Leigh Andrews
Leigh Andrews AKA the #MilkshakeQueen, is former Editor-in-Chief: Marketing & Media at Bizcommunity.com, with a passion for issues of diversity, inclusion and equality, and of course, gourmet food and drinks! She can be reached on Twitter at @Leigh_Andrews.
