Fried bread stick beats off rivals

The 7th China Advertising Festival, held in Wuxi, Jiangsu Province

from October 18-22 crowned the "Fried Bread Stick Bone" print ad as the

overall winner of the awards. The advertisement for a calcium tablet

holds that your bones will turn into a soggy fried bread stick, popular

as a breakfast favorite all over China, if you don't resort to calcium

support.

In minimalist fashion the ad, created by local advertising agency Guilin

Huadun Advertisement Planning, shows a fried breadstick, which

characteristically has the shape of a bone.

"At this year's advertising festival there were quite a few inspiring

and great ideas," says J Walter Thompson/Bridge China executive creative

director, China Lo Sheung Yan, who was on the judging panel for the

second year running.

"Local talent is showing great promise by using a local simple story to

show what the product is about. The bread stick, which everyone in China

knows and which really comes from local culture, is a very good

example," said Mr Lo.

The now annual advertising awards, which were held in Wuxi for the

second year running, saw a total of 1,760 entries come in from across

the country, including 1,166 entries for the category print, 468 for

audio visual and 126 for radio.

In total, nine golden medals were awarded, 30 silver and 78 bronze

medals.

He Qiyuan, director of the training department of the China Advertising

Association and vice secretary general and office director of the

Organising Committee of the 7th China Advertising Festival, said,

"Overall there was a great improvement in (the) quality of entries,

while local advertising companies show promise to catch up to

international levels within the next two years."

Reflecting the industry, general print showed a higher standard than

cash-intensive TV commercials, while government-promoted public welfare

commercials figured prominently.

Three gold prizes for television commercials were awarded. Gold for the

consumer product category went to a "Nike Heart Beat" by J Walter

Thompson/Bridge, gold for the public welfare category went to "Happy

Spring Festival" by Beijing Sang Xia Advertising and the category

Dotcom/various went to "Soim.Com" by Pacesetter Pictures International

(PPI).

Five categories were awarded in the print sector. Corporate Image was

won by "CoolBid.com" by Euro RSCG Partnership, Health Care products,

Fried Bead Stick Bone" by Guilin Huadun Advertisement Planning, three

public welfare awards went to, "Football Hooligan" by J Walter

Thompson/Bridge, "Education for less well off children" and "Spider Web

Bra" and "Spider Web Underwear", both by Bates Advertising Shanghai.

One gold radio award went to the public welfare category for

"Concentrate on one thing rather than two" by the Transportation

Editorial Department of Henan People's Radio Station.

As a first, the National Youth Advertising Design Awards were held,

where young upcoming talent competed with one another on creating an

advertising campaign in a limited amount of time. Chao Shaojun and Feng

Dapeng from McCann Erickson Guangming, Guangzhou took home the award

after being locked away for 24 hours with the task to develop a campaign

for next year's youth advertising competition.

Said Mr He, "The awards were very well received by the young talents and

they participated in a very enthusiastic way. The awards also open many

opportunities for the winners.

"This year's awards were much more balanced than last year's," Mr Lo

continued, "and it was very much an interactive experience between the

15 judges, 10 from the mainland and five international judges."

Mr Lo said, "Last year was a real experience as the judges were seeing

advertisement in a very different way. This year there was much more

discussion about the advertisement, while a local judges could explain

to us why something would work in Xinjiang for example, while we could

give our international input."

While Wuxi has put in a bid to host the event every other year, for now

it has not been decided where next year's awards will take place. While

there is still much to be done to make the festival an international

event, the first priority is to continue to increase the national

standing of the awards for an industry which incorporates more than

60,000 companies.

Source: CMM Intelligence.