APG Awards: The Monkeys wins Strategic Agency of the Year; Fabio Buresti takes out Grand Prix and Gold for OAK flavoured milk

Fabio Buresti (middle, right), executive planning director/partner from The Monkeys has been awarded The Grand Prix at this year’s Creative Strategy Awards along with Strategic Agency of the Year and one gold in the new brand or advertiser category for OAK- flavoured milk.

The Account Planning Group (APG) announced the winners at yesterday’s awards presentation in Sydney last night.

Overall, five gold and two silver prizes were awarded on the night, as well as six special prizes, in addition to the Grand Prix. The winners were selected from 74 entries, resulting in 29 shortlisted case studies. Special awards including best insight, best approach to research, best use of data, best non-traditional idea and best under 50k budget.

Says Olly Taylor, chairman of judges and chief strategy officer/partner, Host: “The variety and quality of the APG shortlist this year shows that Australian planning is in excellent shape. I believe planning is most useful when it leads to communication that changes your point of view on a brand. We had more entries than ever and the best of them were outstanding examples of how inspired planning does just that. The winners should be rightly proud.”

Other gold winners included BMF, 303Lowe, Droga5 and George Patterson Y&R. Naked Communications and Droga5 took home silver.

This year’s awards saw the introduction of the inaugural Strategic Agency of the Year award (awarded to the Monkeys). The award recognises the contribution an agency can make to the development of excellence in strategic thinking and creative solutions for business challenges. The judging panel for this award included Darren Woolley, Trinity P3, Peter Boone, Unilever, Anthony Hourigan, Hourigan International Jon Bradshaw, formerly of Lion and Dave Cobban, Nike US.

Says Dave Cobban, strategic agency chairman of judges from Nike: “We saw seven fantastic agencies compete for the inaugural Strategic Agency of the Year.  What was clear overall is that great planning is a game of two halves – complexity versus simplicity, rigor versus vigor, advertising versus business ideas, strategy versus creative. The Monkeys demonstrated an exceptional mastery of this duality.”

The Best under 50k budget was awarded to Whybin\TBWA’s Paul Bradbury for M.J Bale,   

best non traditional thinking was awarded to BMF ‘s Rob Chandler  for Commonwealth bank – Investorville, Best insight went to George Patterson Y&R’s Meredith Simpson, and Tom Ward for Cadbury Favourites,  best approach to research was taken out by BMF’s Simon McCrudden  for Lion – Tooheys Extra Dry, while the best use of data award went to Whybin\TBWA’s Hristos Varouhas for RaboDirect. 

The Stage Two Judges responsible for picking the 2012 winners were: Olly Taylor, Host, Sudeep Gohil, Droga5, Chrissy Blackburn, The Leading Edge, Jeremy Nicholas, BMF, Phil Hayden, Tom Ward, George Patterson Y&R, Fabio Buresti, The Monkeys, Jamie Mackay, BWM.

The APG awards are powered by the Communications Council’s APG Committee consisting of Sudeep Gohil, CEO – Droga5, Russ Mitchinson, planning partner – DDB, Matt Walters, head of planning – Clemenger BBDO, Jules Hall, managing director – The Hallway, Jon Holloway, strategic planning director – The Works, Carrie Booth, strategy planner – Host, Lucy Cochran, strategy planner – AJF Partnership (Melbourne), Angela Morris, head of planning – JWT Melbourne, Justin Graham, planning director – Droga5, Ben Hourahine, head of strategy – Amnesia, Thomas McGillick, Jon McKie, managing director – 303, Georgia Thomas, agency director – Ikon.

The awards are sponsored by Sandy Oldham Consulting, BWM, Inspire Foundation, GFK Blue Moon, DDB and Digital Edge.

The Creative Strategy Awards Call for Entry was launched with the help of the team from DDB, designing the “Fulfill your prophecy” campaign.

View full list of winners – APG Winners_2012.pdf

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(Pictured: 1) Team Monkeys; 2) Olly Taylor; 3) Olly Taylor – Host & Chairman of Judges, Paul Bradbury – Whybin\TBWA, Anthony Hourigan – Hourigan International, Hristos Varouhas – Whybin\TBWA, Colleague – Whybin\TBWA; 4) Team BMF; 5) Sudeep Gohil – Droga5 CEO; 6) Dave Cobban – Nike and strategic agency chairman of judges).