Here’s a choice nugget from Lewis Lazare’s column today, talking about the national ADDY awards:
Leo Burnett won the Best of Show in the print category at the 2005 ADDY Awards for a Cort Guitars campaign. With 18 gold and five silver ADDYs, Burnett also was the most awarded agency in the competition. Burnett’s Deputy Worldwide Chief Creative Officer Mark Tutssel headed the judging at the show.
Guess it pays to judge your own work. From a distance, this sounds like it has all the legitimacy of an election in Zimbabwe.
UPDATE: I believe this is part of the winning campaign. You be the judge.
I dunno. I kind of like the ad. One minor quibble: If the guitar really is a ticket to fame, wouldn’t he have traded up to a snazzier car, too? At least a Volvo, for crying out loud.
Now whether this particular campaign merits being named Best of Show is another question. But, ultimately, does it really matter?
This obsession with award shows has long been one of my pet peeves – right up there with spineless AEs and soul patches worn by pretentious creative directors. Maybe it’s sour grapes on my part: I have never won a major award – nor am I likely to.
But do award shows serve any purpose beyond feeding the already supersized egos of a handful of creatives? Way back in the day, you could make a case that they exposed you to great stuff from other regions and countries you might otherwise never have seen.
But between publications like CA, Archive and Creativity (as biased as some of them are towards certain agencies) and sites like this on the Internet, you’ve pretty much seen most of the award-winning work already.
And honestly, do you really need to wait for Lee Clow or Jeff Goodby or Dan Weiden – as brilliant as they are – to validate your opinions? Aren’t you perfectly capable of judging an ad’s merits on your own?
And when you come right down to it, whose opinions matter the most? Those of us in the industry – or the people the ads are ostensibly trying to reach?
Truth be told, the Effies – as unglamorous and unsexy as they are – are probably the only awards that should really matter. Too often, we forget that we are creating advertising, not art.
Sorry to ramble on like this. I’d be interesting in hearing what the rest of you have to say.
They say you can add 20K to your salary for every Pencil won. That’s about the only redeeming aspect I can see in pursuing such self-referential vanities.