In the Company of Huskies were awarded The Grand Prix, two golds and two silvers at ADFX 2018. Held every two years by the Institute of Advertising Practitioners in Ireland, ADFX honours the most effective advertising campaigns in the Irish market.
The Grand Prix award winning campaign tells the story of how a bespoke Irish campaign rescued the Nissan Micra brand in a declining car market. Mark Earls, one of the ADFX judges called it “a brilliant story of creativity, bravery and transformational results”.
Nissan took the brave decision not to use the existing European campaign assets for the launch of the redesigned Micra. Instead they invested in an Irish campaign in a bid to revitalise the brand in Ireland. The result was a radical departure from previous car advertising. The ‘No More Nice Car’ campaign converted a generation of brand rejecters into brand supporters and was a huge commercial success. Nissan doubled its share of the small car segment to 10% in Ireland, outperforming other European markets.
Jonathan Forrest, CEO, In the Company of Huskies says “We are so delighted to have won the Grand Prix. It is a testament to Huskies ability to combine creativity with expertise in digital and data, or as we like to call it ‘Magic and Machines’ to produce transformational results. We would like to thank Nissan for their confidence in us to produce this campaign. The key criteria for an award win are a great strategic idea, powerful creative and successful business results. We are thrilled that IAPI chose our campaign.”
In addition to the Grand Prix, In the Company of Huskies also picked up two gold awards on the night for the same campaign and two silver awards, alongside MediaCom, for campaigns for St. Vincent de Paul for long term effectiveness and Public Service, Social Welfare & Education.