When the first Lion winners were announced on Monday, Ogilvy, FCB, and Klick Health became Canada’s first winners of 2023.
Ogilvy Toronto’s “The Cost of Beauty,” a joint effort with Ogilvy London, won a Gold and two Silver Lions in the Health & Wellness competition.
The film, part of Dove’s ongoing Self-Esteem Project, shows a vibrant young girl being bombarded with unhealthy messages on social media until she eventually develops an eating disorder.
FCB won a Silver Lion for “Runner 321” for Adidas, a campaign that asked marathons to hold bib #321 for runners with Down syndrome or other neurodivergent athletes.
And “The Bridge,” the heart-wrenching-turned-heartwarming animated short from Klick Health for Paws NY, won a Bronze to round out the Canadian winners.
In total there were nearly 1,300 submissions to the Health & Wellness Lions, with just 37 trophies awarded.
The Grand Prix went to “The Last Performance,” by Special Auckland for Partners Life insurance.
“This is being awarded for a product that is exceptionally hard to market,” said jury president Mel Routhier, chief creative officer at VMLY&R Chicago.
“It’s a product that nobody wants to think about, much less buy. It’s an idea that uses media in a brilliantly creative and innovative way. It’s an idea that actually finds a way to put the words entertainment and advertising side by side. You actually want to watch that thing that so many people skip.
Routhier also addressed the subject of purpose marketing, likely to be a common theme this year.
“We talked a lot about—and are talking a lot about in our industry—purpose-driven work. And we would actually argue that this piece of work maybe is bringing our industry back to its original [roots], which is about celebrating the purity of a really, really simple, good idea, well done in a way that makes us all jealous as hell.”
Routhier also pointed that “The Last Performance” was entered only once. It proves how a powerful idea can cut through and resonate, she said. “We just saw it continue to rise up through the ranks.
In the Pharma Lions, Klick Health’s “Lifesaving Radio” for Nextmed was the lone Canadian winner with a Bronze Lions.*
Speaking about overall themes in the work, Pharma jury president Joshua Prince, CEO, for the professional group at Omnicom Health Group, said brands are starting to be more experimental in the category to fuse science and emotion, and are showing greater interest in work that addresses health care inequality.
Prince also talked about what is almost certain to be another common theme this year: the application of artificial intelligence.
“Even though we had some submissions with AI… We’re still seeing the power of human creativity to address complex medical problems, to engage people and to serve brands,” he said.
The Grand Prix was given to Dentsu (New York, Chicago and Buenos Aires) and Eurofarma for “Scrolling Therapy,” a digital tool that enables people with Parkinson’s to control their social feeds using facial therapy exercises.
This was an example of marrying science and emotion and the application of human creativity to address complex medical problems, said Prince.
“The idea of harnessing technology, to not only engage patients—and in this case, it’s Parkinson’s patients—but actually to materially help them is a powerful creative idea,” he said.
“We think more ideas like this—from the industry, from the pharmaceutical companies and from brands—is another way, beyond just advertising, to really use creativity as a force for good.”
Also announced Monday was the Health Lions Grand Prix for Good, which is awarded to work for a non-profit organization. The winner was the Publicis led “Working with Cancer” campaign for Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center.
This story has been corrected. We overlooked the Klick Health Bronze win in our original story.
