Maxus tops at Media Abbys

Gets 11 awards; Lodestar Universal comes second.

It was a close finish for media agencies Maxus and Lodestar Universal at the Media Abby Awards announced today on the sunny beach of Cavelossim in South Goa. Maxus, a GroupM agency, bagged a total of 11 awards, followed closely behind by IPG group’s Lodestar Universal with nine awards.

Mindshare, another GroupM agency, came third with seven awards, while Mudra Max, the media arm of the Mudra group, ranked fourth with six awards.

“In all, there were 39 awards across eight agencies,” said Shashi Sinha, chairman of this year’s edition of the Media Abbys event. “The spread was good,” he said on the sidelines of the Goafest ad meet.

The top four winning agencies, incidentally, took home all the nine gold trophies announced during the course of the awards presentation. However, top agency Maxus managed only one gold, while Lodestar and Mudra Max had three golds each. Mindshare got two golds.

The ad campaigns that were recognised by the jury were for such brands as Vodafone (the Zoozoo Marathon), Tata Nano (Nano Innovations) and Gillette Mach 3 (Shave India Movement). Also included were Surf Excel, Sunsilk, Axe from Hindustan Unilever, Nokia and Aircel. “The campaigns that won were part of a sustained effort to build the brand,” explained Sinha. “They were not one-offs executed with awards in mind,” he said, while taking a dig at the general practice of creative agencies to produce work with the sole purpose of winning awards.

This year, the Media Abbys received a total of 484 entries — 15 per cent more than last year. The first round of judging involved 51 jurors. They reduced the entries from 484 to 81. The second and final round involved 14 judges, who brought down the number to 39, said Sinha.

“The quality of work was good overall. The work, especially in the media mix or integrated campaign category, print and internet, were excellent,” he pointed out. “I was particularly impressed with the work that was entered in the internet category. It has improved,” he added.