Souvenirs from Lisbon

Matthias Graf, CEO Burson-Marsteller
PR Jury

Nothing works without PR
Eurobest 2013 showed once again: Without PR, a campaign is only half a thing. However, the PR jury rubbed its eyes in amazement: In the PR category, the prizes were mainly won by advertising agencies. Of course, on the one hand Eurobest is a creative festival that is mainly attended by advertisers. In addition, consumer campaigns that focus on effects and visual power - the domain of advertising agencies - are mainly submitted for such awards.

To score points at events like Eurobest, you need a wow effect. That's what the award-winning PR campaigns have, and they show that the merging of the disciplines of PR, advertising, film and media produces outstanding integrated campaigns. But so far, advertising agencies seem to have understood better than PR agencies how to drive this integration.

However, it is not primarily advertising elements that make an integrated campaign a winner, but the PR elements. This is shown by the PR Grand Prix winner "Why don't you come over" by GMP Advertising/Bucharest: A political topic is creatively taken up and turned into a witty counter-campaign, with resounding success. Pure PR, underpinned with thought models from advertising, scattered across the online community, broadly placed on the media agenda by print and TV. Implemented by... an advertising agency. This must wake up the PR agencies! Because they have it in their hands to lead the discipline of integrated campaigns thanks to PR tools. With creativity - and with wow factor!

My personal favorite: "We are David Bailey" for Samsung. 

Sarida Bossoni, Agency Producer Jung von Matt/Limmat
Film Craft Jury

Being part of the jury for Film Craft at Eurobest in Lisbon was a great experience for me. There were really many excellently crafted works.
This made the decision for us jurors sometimes extremely difficult and has led to some interesting and insightful discussions within the jury.

An exciting debate arose, for example, on the subject of casting in the "Premium by Jack and Jones" campaign. In this case, the following question had to be clarified:

Was Christopher Walken already in the agency script and thus set, or was he suggested for the film by the director? In other words, was it a casting performance, yes or no? We finally defined the question for us like this: Does the casting make the film better? We were able to unanimously answer "yes" to that. (Editor's note: The director, Martin Werner, has written in the Interview with Werbewoche told more about the background and the film shooting).

My personal favorite from the category "Film Craft" is the Film "The Lover" for Come4.org, which also received the Grand Prix. 

Nicolas Noth, Executive Managing Director, PHD Switzerland
Media Jury

What I take away from Eurobest is the memory of a wonderful week in Lisbon. As a juror, I was particularly pleased to see that transmedia approaches now seem to be state of the art. People are moving away from traditional advertising and implementing the storytelling approach on all channels. The Milka campaign (Grand Prix Media) shows that the approach can go much further - even to the point of adjusting the production chain (a piece was removed from each chocolate bar). I believe it would therefore be consistent to sooner or later abolish the singular categories at the awards and to evaluate campaigns holistically.

My personal favorite was "Sky Livespots". The pay TV channel ran commercials with live images. On various free TV channels, the Champions League was broadcast during the commercial breaks, which was currently running on the pay TV channel. This is an organizational and technical masterstroke. What better way to advertise a sports channel? And: Sky recorded a significant increase in subscription orders.

SKY Livespots - case film from serviceplan group on Vimeo.

Unfortunately, I found the quality of the digital campaigns almost shameful. Many were downright mediocre. It can be assumed that specialized agencies are not particularly interested in submitting. Incidentally, media agencies were also sparsely represented, which is a shame. By participating, they could position themselves as providers who intelligently implement creative approaches.

Ralf Kostgeld, Creative Director Ammarkt
Film and Print/Print & Poster Craft Jury

Europe's most valuable currency: ideas.
In a time when everyone offers everything in abundance, creativity is also becoming increasingly important for the economic success of many companies - regardless of whether it's a small firm or a top international brand. In today's information tsunami, the only way to stand out from the crowd and create desirability is with the most creative communication, marketing or business ideas. Unless - as we know - you have an enormous media budget.

And if these ideas are particularly spectacular, you ideally benefit from free press coverage. Sometimes even worldwide. This year, an unusually large number of successful campaigns for brands such as Volvo, Geox, Milka Schokolade, Jack&Jones and Expedia in almost all categories demonstrate this. Including my personal favorite, the clever PR campaign "Why don't you come over"which overnight became the biggest image campaign of all time for Romania and attracted international attention.

Another worldwide "talking piece" was created just a few days ago by my Eurobest jury colleague Andrea Stillaci with his French agency Herezie. A spectacular 9 x 30 meter long Luis Vuitton suitcase as an exhibition pavilion on Moscow's Red Square. Therefore, after a week with many convincing works and in line with the good pre-Christmas consumer mood, I recommend: Invest in good ideas.

Grischa Rubinick, Creative Director Publicis
Direct and Promo & Activation Jury

Eurobest 2013, the European vestival of creativiti.
It was a great honor for me when I got the message to be allowed to judge at Eurobest. After all, it was my first international judging. The jury group in the categories "Direct and Promo & Activation", of which I was also a member, consisted of 13 people from all over Europe.

The criteria to be evaluated were as follows: Creativity 30, Strategy 20, Implementation 20 and Results 30 percent. 

In my opinion, the biggest challenge was not a lack of experience on the part of the jury or indecisiveness, but simply the language barrier - which after all affected almost half of the jurors. In larger discussions on complex works, which sometimes lasted up to 30 minutes, the same people therefore always argued.
After two days and 15 hours of judging each (without daylight, but with cold pizza), we had to decide on one Grand Prix candidate per category.
Even though it wasn't easy: The way I see it, the right contenders were allowed to cheer at the end: KBC Bank "The Gap in the Market. and Geox "7 Days of Rain.
Geox is also my personal favorite. It's a simple product demo, implemented in a surprising and fresh way.

Johannes Dörig (AD, Leo Burnett) and Niels Schäfer (AD, Wirz)
Young Creatives Integrated Competition

What was your motivation to participate in the award?
It's extremely exciting to be able to work on a briefing outside of the normal agency structures for once. You are your own CD, so to speak, thinking, conceiving, discarding and designing everything yourself.
The special thing about the Eurobest young talent competition is that you get to compete against teams from all over Europe. This is an extremely appealing opportunity to prove one's skills.

What was the biggest challenge?
The biggest challenge was certainly the time pressure. Creating an integrated campaign in just under 24 hours is not easy or commonplace in itself. Being in direct competition with 18 other teams doesn't really simplify the task.

What do you take away from the competition?
Of course, unforgettable impressions that motivate us to think in larger contexts in our everyday work. And many wonderful memories of the contacts with the Young Creatives from all over Europe.

Your favorites at the Eurobest?
Niels Schäfer: Geox "7 Days of Rain, Volvo Trucks "Live Test as well as Hornbach "The Hornbach Hammer.
Johannes Dörig: Geox "7 Days of Rain" .

Also on site was Publicitas, the official Swiss festival representative. Finally, Sibylle Widmer draws her personal conclusion. 

Sibylle Widmer, Manager Marketing Communication Publicitas

The visit to the Eurobest Festival was an educational and inspiring experience with a great selection of presentations and workshops. The presentation "Dancing with Failure" by Tor Myhren (President & Worldwide CCO Grey), in which he showed how the agency managed to become one of the most awarded agencies again, impressed me personally. Likewise the Independent Agency Showcase with The Newtons Laboratory Greece and Bruketa&Zinic. It shows that creativity can make a big difference even in crisis situations and with little money. The festival was a place of inspiration and networking for me.
As the Swiss representative of the festival, Publicitas was responsible for the nomination of the Swiss jurors, among other things. A huge thank you to all the jurors and to our Young Creative Team.

The gold awarded Publicis campaign for Garnier is for me one of the best works I saw at the festival. One of my personal favorites is also "The Opel Sky Surprise"which brought the Austrians the first Grand Prix in history.

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Interview with director Martin Werner about the films for Jack & Jones