Creative ranking 2015: Blood is thicker than ink

At the latest during Cannes Lions, it became clear what probably no one would have expected before: Saatchi & Saatchi Switzerland became the title favorite of the 2015 creative rankings. On the one hand, this was due to the comparatively meager yield of the other Swiss agencies on the Côte d'Azur. On the other hand, the extremely successful outcome of the campaign created by the French Swiss for the Austrian lifestyle gay magazine Vangardist: two gold, two silver, two bronze. The idea of printing a special issue published on the occasion of the Vienna Live Ball with the (sterilized) blood of HIV-positive people was exactly to the taste of the strict Lion jury. Confronting people with their prejudices and fears - and with a print run of 3,000 copies.

The expected festival high continued. Double gold at the prestigious London International Award and at the phenomenal end of the year two Eurobest Grand Prix - in addition to another double gold and double bronze. Incidentally, the agency has also won awards with its campaign in other competitions - for the creative ranking of Werbewoche, however, "only" the three mentioned above count. That shouldn't matter much to the agency, because this year the score of 270 was enough for first place - last year it would have been third place.

Current Top 5: Development since 2006

A lot of traffic at the top

It has not been this close at the top for years. With only five points behind the winner, Leo Burnett and Publicis share second place. Leo Burnett thus defends last year's top spot and continues its creative consistency unwaveringly: Since 2009, the agency from Aemtlerstrasse has been ranked among the top three, and since 2011 it has even been in the top two. Leo Burnett won gold at ADC Switzerland, Swiss Poster Award and SDV Award and scored points at the prestigious competition The Cup.

Publicis also seems to have established itself in the top trio, ranking among the top three for the third time in a row after its steep climb since 2011 (11th place) and 2012 (8th place). The agency secured the 265 points with strong performances at Eurobest (double silver), ADC Switzerland (gold, seven silver) and a full set of medals at this year's Epica Awards. The UBS pension campaign, which won awards in the late Eurobest and Epica competitions, was only launched in September - so it will be interesting to see whether other awards are added for the next ranking.

However, the two big podium dominators of recent years do not have time to catch their breath. Only 18 points separate Ruf Lanz, the smallest agency in the top 10 with twelve employees, from the top trio. The owner-managed Zurich-based creative agency took time out from almost all competitions last year and is now coming back with strong performances. at ADC Switzerland, at the Swiss Poster Award and with the only classified Swiss Clio points back in the front field of the ranking.

The first half of the ranking is completed by the last year's High-flyer Jung von Matt/Limmat. In 2014, the agency - with Pro Infirmis mannequins, among others - scored heavily in all competitions in the top half of the ranking, which cannot be freely selected, and catapulted to the top with 624 points ahead of Leo Burnett (542 points). In 2015, successful performances at ADC Switzerland, Eurobest ("The Great Escape") and The Cup (2014 edition: Mannequins) ensure a good fifth place in the midfield.

From up, down and in

In the second half of the ranking, two up-and-comers meet three "rank losers". FCB Zurich, like Ruf Lanz, makes up four places - after Saatchi & Saatchi, the biggest step forward taken in the top 10 this year. Hinderling Volkart can also count itself among the winners of the year: According to the Best of Swiss Web Ranking Most successful Swiss digital agency 2015 thus also appears in the top 10 of Werbewoche's creative rankings for the first time. Among other things, Hinderling Volkart won gold at ADC Switzerland and was among the winners of the Best of Swiss Web 2015 was one of the big winners with ten awards.

The Y&R Group and Wirz Werbung each lost three places and are now ranked seventh and eighth. Like Jung von Matt/Limmat, Havas Worldwide also lost four positions and, with 57 points, is the last of this year's ten most successful creative agencies in Switzerland. Incidentally, the small Zurich agency Freundliche Grüsse sniffed a surprise this year with the Run-in men campaign collected a remarkable 44 points for the FCZ ladies. By comparison, 49 points were already enough for tenth place in 2013.

Outlook 2016

Changes for the 2016 ranking will be communicated in spring. No awards will disappear from the ranking - with one exception: the Spotlight Festival will be removed from the list of freely selectable awards. In the five years in which the competition was available for selection due to jury cooperation, not a single point was shown in the ranking. The assumption that the award enjoys a manageable relevance among Swiss agencies is obvious. It will be replaced by the renowned New York Festival. In addition, the points of the Best of Swiss Apps competition, which was split off from the Best of Swiss Web, will also be integrated into the ranking. All details will be announced soon enough on Werbewoche.ch.

Already this year, the shortlist of the Epica Award was added as a small supplement to the scoring. The list of finalists was publicly communicated and made available by the award organization for the first time in 2015. Consequently, it was not included in the ranking in previous years. As with all other awards, it is now an integral part of the scoring and is included in the points.

Thomas Häusermann

The detailed ranking can be found our Subscribers in print edition 23/2015 of Friday, December 18, 2015, as well as in the e-paper and as a PDF download. Feedback on the ranking to [email protected]