OMD wins three awards at Cristals

(SUPPLIED)   

OMD won three awards at the recently-held Mena Cristals, while its clients bagged three coveted prizes at the Gulf Marketing Review’s 2008 Gemas, including the Gold Grand Prix.

The agency won in the Banking & Finance category for the launch of Barclays Bank’s retail banking services, in the Women category with the product integration/sponsorship of Perfect Bride by Kellogg’s and with Cheetos’ ‘Chester the Presenter’ operation in the Young People category. There were 36 entries in the long list and no award was presented in three categories.

“These awards are a testament of the tremendous talent in and around our agency. None of this would be possible without teams and clients who embrace creativity and innovation in thinking and execution,” said Eric Bequin, regional managing director of OMD Mena.

“We are proud of the recognition of our peers, be they local, regional or international. We see these awards as an incentive to do even more to demonstrate that OMD is about delivering tangible business results through ‘more, bigger, better ideas, more places, more often’.”

“At Barclays, we place a premium on innovation and collaboration, and both were on display during this campaign. OMD, Impact BBDO and our own internal teams put an enormous effort into this. We’re exceedingly proud of the hard work and creativity of the individuals and teams who made our retail launch a success,” added Barclays Bank’s manager of community affairs, internal communications and corporate affairs, Umayma Abubakar.

“OMD constantly strive to deliver creative, innovative and cutting edge solutions for Kellogg’s. It is fantastic that this pioneering move into branded content has been given the recognition and reward it deserves,” said Will Brockbank, head of marketing at Kellogg’s Middle East.

Earlier, the Gemas judges also named Barclays Bank as winner in the ‘Best Product Launch’ and ‘Best Integrated Campaign’ categories and awarded it the Gold Grand Prix.

Sama, from Saudi Arabia, was also highly commended in the ‘Best New Brand Launch’.

More than 80 entries made it to the short list.