“Best Job in the World” Campaign for Tourism Queensland and “Interactive Vending Machine” for Coca-Cola Collectively Win Six Gold Lions and Three Grand Prix
BOSTON – Sapient (NASDAQ:SAPE) announced that Sapient Interactive, Sapient’s digital marketing services group, and Nitro Group won nine awards at this year’s Cannes Lions International Advertising Festival, the world’s premier showcase for excellence in advertising. Sapient, which announced its intent to acquire Nitro Group on June 17, 2009, expects to close the acquisition in July.
Sapient Interactive and Nitro Group won Cannes Lions awards across all major categories including public relations, direct marketing, interactive marketing and design. This early recognition validates the demand for groundbreaking cross channel work and the tremendous growth potential of the Sapient and Nitro Group combination – which uniquely merges big creative ideas that capture the imagination of consumers with digital sophistication to execute and deliver business results.
“This year’s festival was abuzz with new innovations in interactive, high impact non-traditional advertising, multi-channel marketing and commerce – key areas where Sapient and Nitro really shine,” said Gaston Legorburu, Sapient executive director and worldwide creative officer. “The combination of Nitro and Sapient was specifically created to deliver breakthrough multi-channel marketing and commerce experiences for our clients’ brands. The diversity of this year’s accolades at Cannes illustrates why we feel we can deliver on this promise for our clients right out of the gate.”
“The Best Job in the World” campaign for Tourism Queensland – created by CumminsNitro, the Australian subsidiary of Nitro Group – was this year’s runaway success at Cannes, sweeping nearly all major categories. Sapient’s design work for the Coca-Cola Interactive vending machine was also recognized. Listed below are the awards that Sapient and Nitro won at Cannes:
Cyber Grand Prix in the Cyber Marketing category
Direct Grand Prix in the Direct Marketing category
PR Grand Prix in the Public Relations category
Two Gold Lions in the Public Relations category
Two Gold Lions in the Direct Marketing category
One Gold Lion in the Media category
One Gold Lion in the Design category
“Our clients – Coca-Cola and Tourism Queensland – deserve credit for these honors,” said Legorburu. “These campaigns were the result of active collaborations with these clients and their teams.”
“The Best Job in the World” campaign beat more than 400 other entries from around the world to win the inaugural PR category Grand Prix award and bested over 1,000 entries for the Direct Grand Prix award on the first night of the festival. The campaign also received honors across the following categories: travel, tourism and leisure; best use of the Internet; digital media; and, social media.
The campaign began in January with a search for an “island caretaker” for an Australian paradise island through worldwide classified advertising offering the “Best Job in the World.” More than 34,000 applicants from almost 200 countries applied for the job before Ben Southall was named the island caretaker in early May. Since then, the campaign has generated significant worldwide online, print and broadcast media – resulting in more than $160 million in global publicity value for Tourism Queensland.
The Coca-Cola Interactive vending machine, which debuted at the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing, integrates a 46” Samsung LCD touch screen into the front of a standard vending machine. Sapient designed the user interface consisting of a large format touch screen display combined with dazzling flash, motion graphics, HD video and Bluetooth capabilities to create an immersive experience that fosters the connection between the consumer and the brand. The machine that Coca-Cola unveiled at the Summer Olympics offers branded downloads for phones in the form of music files, ringtones and wallpaper. Coca-Cola is currently rolling out versions of the machine, featuring eye-catching ad platforms, at Simon Malls throughout the United States.
About the Cannes Lions Festival
The Cannes Lions International Advertising Festival is the world’s only truly global meeting place for professionals in the communications industry who want to keep ahead of the curve. During seven days in June, thousands of delegates from 90 countries gather in Cannes to listen to speakers while approximately 250 jury members judge over 22,000 pieces of the most creative advertising from across the world.
About Nitro Group
Nitro Group is a global communications network that spans seven offices around the world. Nitro facilitates measurable business growth for leading clients including Mars, Volvo, Nike, Footlocker and ConAgra through a results-oriented approach that combines communications with business strategy, digital innovation and branded entertainment. Nitro provides these integrated services in a connected way across the globe, clearly differentiating Nitro from the traditional holding companies that are still providing fragmented solutions from disparate businesses. Nitro has been recognized by respected industry observers such as Forbes, The Wall Street Journal and CNN as one of the most innovative and forward thinking agencies in the world. Nitro’s recent “Best Job in the World” campaign for the Queensland Tourist Commission won Best of Show at The One Show. Headquartered in New York, Nitro operates across North America, Europe, Australia and China. For more information, please visit www.nitrogroup.com.
About Sapient Interactive
Sapient Interactive, a division of Sapient (NASDAQ:SAPE), is one of the largest and most innovative interactive marketing and technology services firms in the world. It creates immersive and memorable multi-channel brand experiences that deliver measurable results for clients—including major brands such as Celebrity Cruises, Sony Electronics, Honda Jet and Times Online. One of the only firms to intelligently integrate strategy, creative, advertising, media services, analytics and technology expertise under one roof, Sapient Interactive offers unparalleled experience in emerging channels including social media, mobile devices such as the iPhone, digital in-store displays, self-service kiosks and traditional media. Headquartered in Boston, Sapient Interactive has operations in 20 major cities throughout North America, Europe and Asia.
