UK agencies fail to win Cannes Direct Lions

By Matt Williams, campaignlive.co.uk, Monday, 20 June 2011 08:30PM

CANNES 2011: There was more disappointment for the UK at the 2011 Cannes Festival of Creativity, with UK-based agencies failing to win a single Direct Lion at tonight's awards.

Rom: Romanian campaign win for McCann Erickson Bucharest

McCann Erickson Bucharest followed up its Grand Prix in the Promo & Activation category by also winning the Direct Grand Prix, again thanks to its "American Rom" campaign for the chocolate bar brand Rom.

The award marks the first time that a Romanian agency has won a Grand Prix in any Cannes Lions category.

Nine other Gold Lions were also handed out, one of which went to the hotly-tipped "decode Jay-Z" campaign, created by Droga5 New York to promote Microsoft Bing.

Old Spice continued its run for Wieden & Kennedy Portland, winning a Gold for the "response" campaign.

Meanwhile, two more Gold Lions went to JWT New York, both for the Human Rights Watch "Burma" campaign.

The remaining Gold awards were split between Ogilvy Argentina, DDB Brasil and Cheil Worldwide.

Overall 57 Direct Lions were handed out, with Germany and the US sharing the honour of being the most awarded country, winning seven Lions each.

Brazilian agencies won six awards, while Sweden won five and Spain picked up four.

The result will be doubly disappointing for UK agencies considering last year Abbott Mead Vickers BBDO was named Direct Agency of the Year after a string of award-winning campaigns. 

This article was first published on campaignlive.co.uk