Although we were encouraged to give silver in each category, we believed that each year a bar is set, and the duty of next year's entrants is to reach or leap over that bar. So how did the work this year fare?
I think we were genuinely shocked at the poor standard of the body of work. Excuses abound about the state of creative work in our industry at present, with the recession and its knock-on effects being the prime culprit.
But I believe the greatest recession is the recession of ideas and courage to produce those ideas. I am not just blaming the agencies for this; I am blaming the collective that produces advertising - clients, agencies, market research companies, the lot. Fear of failure should drive us to greater things. Right now, it's not.
Now to the winners. There is some good work here, with the odd sprinkling of freshness. As usual, the jury took into account the categories and their varying difficulty, and we endeavoured to give quite a few merit awards, for you to see the competition the winners were up against.
In conclusion, there is some good work to celebrate.
But we don't deserve too much of a hangover. And to my new-found enemies? I really thought your work was great.
It was the rest of the jury that didn't like it.
THE JUDGES
Steve Parker - UK buying director, Starcom Motive
Bill Wilson - Operations director, OAA
Julie France - Managing director, ClearChannel UK
Neil Dawson - Creative director, TBWA\London
Alan Simmons - Chairman, Concord
John Tisdall - Designer, Abbott Mead Vickers BBDO
Matthew Bull (Chairman of the judges) - Chief executive, Lowe London
Jeremy Craigen - Creative director, DDB London
Andy Jex - Art director, Mother
Simon Clift - President, marketing, HPC, Unilever
Rosie Arnold - Creative director, Bartle Bogle Hegarty
Ben Priest - Creative director, RKCR/Y&R
Nick Georghiou - Photographer
Alison Wright - Former managing director, Manning Gottlieb OMD
Alison Copus - Marketing director, Virgin Atlantic
