Cannes Lions and Ketchum Announce Winners of 2018 Young Lions Marketers Competition

By STS News Desk On Jun 20, 2018

Portugal’s Ana Rita Almeida of Worten and Diogo Vasques of Caixa Económica Montepio Geral won the Gold Lion in the ninth-annual Young Lions Marketers Competition at the 65th annual Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity. Sponsored by Ketchum, this year’s competition challenged 18 teams of young, in-house marketers from around the world to develop a creative brief for a product or service that would benefit the Movember Foundation, the only global charity focused solely on men’s health. Competitors presented their communication plans to a panel of industry leaders, which was led by Ruth Yearley, partner and director of insights and strategy at Ketchum.

Team Portugal developed the winning brief to win the Gold Lion. Almeida said of the campaign brief, “We have now been working together for four years, so we have gotten to the level where we really trust each other and know what the other is thinking. We are so happy, so thrilled to win Gold.”

The team from India, ITC’s Raisa Chakravarty and Anupama Sharma, won the Silver Lion, and the Bronze Lion went to the team from Australia, Commonwealth Bank of Australia’s Jill Elizabeth Harmon and Nathan Kwok.

Ruth Yearley

Participants were briefed onsite at Cannes and then given 30 hours to develop their product or service concept before showcasing their communication plans in a one-page written brief and short presentation to the judging panel. The winning teams will receive their trophies at the Young Lions Marketers Competition award ceremony tomorrow evening in Cannes.

“The range of work we saw today was astonishing, as it all had simplicity at the heart. All of the teams had in common a very clear understanding of the brief, eloquence and top-level smart thinking,” Ruth Yearley said of the judging.

Ruth added, “I felt humbled to be in the presence of such bright, engaging and confident young professionals. The future of the industry is in amazing hands, and I look forward to seeing how they continue to use their talents to make the world a better place.”

Additional participants in this year’s competition hailed from Belarus, Belgium, Brazil, Canada, Chile, Dominican Republic, Finland, Georgia, Hungary, Ireland, Poland, Slovakia, Spain, Sri Lanka and Vietnam. Participants represented leading global brands including Anheuser-Busch InBev, Frito-Lay, Unilever and Johnson & Johnson.

This is the eighth year that Ketchum has sponsored the Young Lions Marketers Competition. In addition, a Ketchum team is representing the U.S. in the Young PR Lions competition for the second consecutive year.