Staff Reporter
Windhoek
Namibian advertising agency, Advantage Y&R, scooped two Loerie Creative Awards over the weekend in Durban, South Africa.
The Loeries are Africa and the Middle East’s premiere initiative that recognizes, rewards, inspires and fosters creative excellence in the brand communication industry. It is safe to say that the Loeries are the Oscars of the advertising industry.
Advantage Y&R won the silver in the category of Media Innovation for the YOLO condoms awareness campaign.
The agency also won silver for the print indoor poster it did for Greenpeace Africa on a pollution awareness campaign.
Loeries Creative Week Durban took place from 14 to 20 August, with the awards ceremonies place on 19 and 20 August.
For the YOLO campaign, Commodity Exchange tasked Advantage Y & R to produce a message that would build buzz for the new YOLO condom brand, as well as remind people to ‘be safe’ over the holidays. The agency came up with the concept of manufacturing large condom-billboards, which they inserted on the anthills dotted along Namibia’s national roads, and which are phallic in shape. Over the Christmas period, holiday-goers were exposed to anthills covered with condoms featuring a ‘be safe’ message, as well as a #YOLOBeSafe hashtag to push brand awareness for YOLO.
To raise awareness for Greenpeace, Advantage Y&R asked two young Namibian artists to create African masks out of trash.
The masks were then photographed on children to hint at the impact of pollution on future generations. Besides running ads in Namibian newspapers and on street poles, the ad agency also displayed posters in schools and colleges to inspire youngsters to rethink how they dispose of trash.
Ten countries participated in the awards, with South Africa scooping 231 awards, followed by United Arab Emirates, which won 46 awards, while Kenya won 10 awards. Israel won six awards, Saudi Arabia five awards.
Namibia, Morocco and Egypt won two awards each while Nigeria and Lebanon won one award each.