Stories about Special Group published on StopPress – Aotearoa/New Zealand’s daily news site for the advertising and marketing industry.
They say: “We are a modern, independent communications company working across advertising, PR, design and digital. With a track record of producing highly effective strategic and creative campaigns. Named ‘New Zealand Effie Agency of the Year’ 2023 & 2025 and Campaign ‘Global Creative Agency of the Year’ 2021, 2023 & 2024 – more than any other agency in the world. We create ideas that drive fame, earn attention and deliver real business results for ambitious brands.”
Special is a founder member of Agency Directory – find out more about them here.
The local ad fraternity, the global cognoscenti and plenty of actual New Zealanders were all smitten with Orcon and Special Group’s ‘Orcon + Iggy’ campaign. But, as cliche-loving rugby players always say, you’re only as good as your last match. And despite the fact the trophies have flowed fairly freely for the pairing in 2010, the Orcon business is currently up for pitch.
Special Group has continued its hot run of form in 2010 by nabbing a slice of the MediaWorks TV business. And the first task has been to rebrand and relaunch the youth-focused music channel C4 and turn it into a slightly less youth focused mainstream entertainment channel called FOUR.
We reported on the unofficial results that placed New Zealand ninth best country overall soon after the big leonine haul at Cannes this year, and the just-released official report has confirmed our position in the top ten—and not per head of population, either, just flat out ninth most creative country in the world based on the awards Kiwi agencies won at the prestigious advertising event.
A spoonful of appointments news always makes the medicine go down.
Yet more proof, if any were needed, that the indie agencies are now too legit to quit after Special Group’s creative director Tony Bradbourne was appointed as the convenor of judges for the 2011 Axis awards, the first time the honour has gone to anyone from an independent agency.
It received a fantastic response from StopPress readers when it went live and, not surprisingly, Special Group, Exposure and Salt Interactive’s ‘Living Office’ banner for Orcon has also found favour with the judges of the Interactive Advertising Bureau’s September Bolly Award.
Everyone seems to be taking the American approach and neither confirming or denying who has nabbed the Lion Red and Waikato Draught business, but after talking to psychics, futurists and a few other humans, it seems fairly safe to assume that Lion’s unloved children have found new parents in the form of DDB and Josh&Jamie/Assignment.
The good ship Special Group continues to steam ahead, taking home yet another Grand Prix (and US$10,000) for its greedy ‘Orcon + Iggy’ campaign at the AdStars gala awards at Busan in Korea.
Banner ads are often criticised for being boring, cheesy, annoying, intrusive or a combination of all four. David McGregor, writing in Idealog, went as far as calling online promotional activity “the Great Pacific Garbage Patch of the advertising business”. But Orcon, Special Group, Exposure and Salt Interactive have joined forces to show that very good things can happen when the utility of the digital space is combined with the ideas of agency land.
Special Group’s print ad for ecostore ended up sparking off a rather heated discussion about the exciting realm of PH levels in washing powder when we wrote a story about the whole malarkey a few weeks back. And the swift response obviously tickled the fancies of the Newspaper Advertising Bureau’s Newspaper Ad of the Month judges, because it’s been awarded the gong for the July round.
For the second year in a row, DDB walked away with a cool $10,000 after the Sky Arts Channel Mark Rothco spot took out the Newspaper Ad of the Year prize last week (this Throaties spot won the 2009 edition). And the highlight of the night—aside, of course, from the big grand finale announcement, the delectable nibbles and the burly guard who was keeping watch over the silver briefcase on the table that was filled with $10,000 cash—had to be the Q+A video with Chuck Porter, the convenor of judges at this year’s event and co-founder of award-hogging US ad agency Crispin Porter + Bogusky.
It seems the print media’s dastardly scheme to get aggrieved companies to take out full page ads is working: after Air New Zealand responded to a Listener editorial with a cheeky video featuring Rob Fyfe, a dedicated website and a few full-pagers, ecostore has decided to follow suit, joining the reactionary party last weekend after an article in the Herald about washing powder ruffled its eco-feathers.
After every Olympic Games, New Zealand’s obsession with medal tables and country rankings becomes apparent as we do a few sums, take comfort in our per capita performance and repeatedly utter the phrase ‘punching above our weight’. But in the advertising world, if results from the Cannes Lions are anything to go by, New Zealand doesn’t even need to rely on per capita results, because the 25 Lions won by Kiwi agencies, which was up from 23 in 2009, meant we were again near the top of the pile in terms of total awards won.
Who it’s for: TSB by Special Group and Robber’s Dog
Why we like it: TSB Bank has been at the top of the banking customer service charts for a while now. And, as a result of this solid reputation, it’s also New Zealand’s most …
Big news came through yesterday that Kingsland indie agency Special Group had picked up the extremely coveted Grand Prix award in the Direct category at the Cannes Lions. Sadly, the Special Groupies were too busy doing actual work back in New Zealand and couldn’t get to Cannes to pick up the trophy, wallow in glory and revel in the fact that they were among the world’s best. But Our Maan in Cannes was.
“Let’s take a ride and see what’s mine” sang Iggy Pop on his seminal 1977 track ‘The Passenger’. For Special Group, who co-opted the track and the man himself for their ‘Orcon + Iggy’ campaign, what’s theirs is a Grand Prix Award in the Direct Category at the 2010 Cannes Lions Festival.
The 57th Annual Cannes Lions International Advertising Festival is underway with the announcement of the first three shortlists in the Direct Lions, Promo & Activation Lions and PR Lions categories. And, in keeping with the theme de jour (that’s French, don’t you know), the Kiwi contingent are off to a flying start, with 13 campaigns making the grade. Choosing another similar long skinny country as a random point of comparison, Italy has nine campaigns shortlisted in the same categories.
The good ship Special Group continues to cut a swathe through adland and its most recent appointment has given it the drinks trolley: after a competitive pitch, the Kingsland-based AXIS hoggers have been appointed, effective immediately, to handle Lion Nathan’s suite of Diageo brands, which includes Smirnoff, Baileys, Guinness and Johnny Walker.
Ecostore wants to take on the world. So it’s appointed Special Group as the design and communications agency to help do it.
There have been a plethora of announcements about finalists and nomination lists for international advertising awards in the last few days. And just a select few Kiwi agencies have garnered accolades and praise for their handiwork.
You can almost feel the collective hangover after 680 creatively-minded humans gathered together last night at the huge and rather impressive Orams Marine Boat Park to celebrate the 30th birthday of the CAANZ Axis awards, as well as the creativity, ideas and personalities the industry has fostered in that time.
TSB Bank has chosen agency Special Group to handle all its communications requirements. The appointment comes after a 3-way creative pitch.
A large part of the appeal of awards ceremonies is the controversy that inevitably follows the announcements. And, as per usual, there was plenty of robust debate about the worthiness of the winners at this year’s Effies, Kiwi adland’s premier awards.
In recognition of the high level of quality work submitted for the 2009 CAANZ EFFIE® Awards, judges awarded 9 Gold, 16 Silver and 22 Bronze EFFIEs this year – an indication the industry continues to reach new heights of effectiveness.
Presented annually by the Communication Agencies Association of New Zealand (CAANZ …