Jung von Matt is back at the top of the creative rankings

"It's hard to imagine where we'll be next year," said the then new Young von Matt creative director Dennis Lück a year ago. And added: "Where we want to be, that's very clear."

The rank Lück was aiming for with his new employer is obvious. And it has become a fact: Jung von Matt/Limmat is once again at the top of the creative rankings after 2014. Lück, who admits to having "picked up the slide rule here and there," doesn't want to know anything about planning too concretely for a ranking win: "We hoped - we did. We've only reckoned with it in our wildest imaginings.

The joy at Wolfbachstrasse in Zurich is correspondingly great. "To be at the top this very year is indeed a special achievement for us," says Lück. "Our focus in 2017 was on building up a project organization, on improving processes and structures for our customers, on developing new business areas, and, and, and. The fact that we then also achieved the top spot alongside all these elaborate tasks is a testament to the creative power of our people."

Only Lemmy is cult

Dennis Lück is often in the spotlight as a person - even outside the advertising industry. He gives speeches in his adopted hometown of Wohlen, the Wohler Anzeiger devotes double-page interviews to him, and "Glanz&Gloria" visits the reigning "Advertiser of the Year" at home and profiles him and his family. Does he like the cult surrounding him? Lück keeps a cool head: "It's easy to be tempted to want to enjoy it. But the fact is: it's simply wrong and not justified. Communication is a team sport. The team is the cult. The courageous customer is the cult. The great external helpers are the cult." And the self-confessed fan of hard and loud electric guitars adds, "Quite apart from that, there must be only one person you can call cult. And that is Lemmy from Motörhead."

Lück is correspondingly modest and sober in his assessment of his influence as CCO on the agency's successes: "I'm one person in a big dark green team. It's not hierarchy or titles that count, it's the will to work for success that counts. So I am exactly one of about 100 who have contributed to the successes. No more, but also no less."

The great absentees

The conditions for regaining the top spot were good in 2017. The award break of the global Publicis Group led to the absence of Publicis, Leo Burnett, and Saatchi & Saatchi - three agencies that have repeatedly occupied top positions in the rankings in the past. Whether this year would have been a match for Jung von Matt is at least questionable - also in view of the points scored in the past two years. "You have to use really strong herbs against us," laughs Lück. And emphasizes that he by no means welcomes the absence: "I'm certainly happy to see them back in full force. Competition increases one's own ambition."

FCB Zurich double

The last year's Winner, FCB Zurich, does not let hangover arise in the following year and positions itself on the second and thus again a top rank. The two runaway campaigns "Bandenbingo" for HC Davos and "Search Racism. Find Truth." for Flüchtlinge Willkommen again earned the agency valuable points at various national and international awards - including competitions D&AD, One Show, ADC Switzerland and ADC Europe.

The two campaigns have now gone through and completed the award cycle - the yield is impressive. Whether FCB Zurich will be able to build on these successes in the near future and once again be at the top of the rankings remains to be seen. "I leave forecasts to the weathermen," says CEO Cornelia Harder in this regard. "What will happen next year, we will see. There are many creative minds in Switzerland, and as you can see from this year's ranking, there are always new players who can outshine the 'usual suspects'."

Ruf Lanz leaves no stone unturned

Ruf Lanz is definitely one of the "usual suspects". A Top 10 without the small, owner-managed agency with just twelve employees seems unthinkable. Not just a feeling, but backed up with figures: since its founding in 2001 (and the subsequent ranking in 2002), the Zurich agency has occupied a top 10 position without interruption, with one exception always in the top 5. Nothing has changed in this respect in the 16th year - third place.

The secret behind this consistency? Co-owner Markus Ruf explains: "There is no secret, but there is a conviction: No one has been waiting for customers' messages. It takes an idea that packages them in such a surprising way that the oversaturated audience wants to hear them in the first place. That's what we work hard for. The awards are a nice retrospective confirmation of that." Ruf says he is particularly pleased that in 2017, too, the company received awards not just for one or two pieces of work, but for many clients, some of whom have been with the company for many years.

Top awards and a premiere

In this respect, iart cannot offer diversity. But with the light frieze at the Kunstmuseum Basel, a project that convinced the juries of the most highly endowed creative competitions to such an extent that it resulted in gold at the Cannes Lions and One Show awards, among others. And the Basel-based company is also responsible for a premiere: for the first time since the ranking was established, a non-agency has made it into the list of the best. CEO Valentin Spiess describes the awards and the ranking, about which the company is "delighted", as a "pleasant side effect": "The awards help us to raise our profile. But our team is mainly motivated by the projects themselves, which repeatedly present us with design or technical challenges. We gladly accept the irritated side glances from the agency world. We observe that corporate communications is turning to new forms." With its broad competence profile, Spiess is convinced that the company is excellently positioned for this.

The light frieze, which iart developed together with the architectural firm Christ & Gantenbein, won numerous awards last year - even outside the advertising industry. "Many awards came from the design and lighting sector and were therefore not included in this ranking at all," says Spiess. What is submitted to which competitions and when depends on numerous factors. "Our projects vary widely, from work in museums and media in space to media architecture in lighting frieze," Spiess says. In addition, he said, some are completed in a few months, while others take years to work on. "Over time, you develop a sense of what goes over well with juries."

A glance at the collection of trophies shows that iart is neither a newcomer nor a "one hit wonder" when it comes to creative awards. In the past, the Basel-based company has already won the Cannes Lions Innovation Grand Prix, various ADC Awards and D&AD Pencils, among others. So it's quite possible that the name hasn't appeared in the creative rankings for the last time. The Rhine region is accordingly ambitious. The goal for the next ranking? "Defending our top position as a non-agency among agencies," says CEO Spiess. We can be curious.

Kind regards from the top group

One more name stands out in the top 5: Friendly Greetings. The agency appeared in the top 10 rankings for the first time last year, taking eighth place for the premiere. With a significant increase in points thanks to awards at competitions such as Cannes Lions, D&AD, ADC Europe and ADC Switzerland, this year it succeeds in making it into the top five.

It almost seems as if the agency, which was only founded in 2014, is beginning to shed its newcomer image and establish itself in the field of established names. "Yes, we have sort of clawed our way in," says Samuel Textor, creative director and co-founder of Freundliche Grüsse. "We're going to continue to fully embrace creativity. So we can take our newcomer momentum into the established circle."

Thomas Häusermann

You can find the detailed creative ranking as well as further reporting with additional voices in the current Advertising Week 1/2018 of January 12, 2018.