How an “Elegant” Selfless Act Guided the 2025 Print & Publishing Grand Prix

The moment the jury president excused himself from the room before deliberations over his own agency’s work was a turning point that decided the Print & Publishing Grand Prix at Cannes Lions 2025.

The top accolade in the category was awarded to ‘Price Packs’ – a project for German supermarket PENNY – on Monday. But jury member Stephan Schwarz tells LBB exclusively that its selection was partly due the “elegant” act of jury president Icaro Doria removing himself from the deliberations.

Thanks to a diverse and wildly international jury makeup, Stephan notes that the Lions they had awarded were already strong and representative, “diverse, and coming from every angle in the category,” he says. They ended up with four Golds. And from those four Golds, they needed to choose a Grand Prix.

One such Gold was for ‘Plastic Blood’, a pioneering project by Brazilian agency DM9 for OKA Biotech. As Icaro is president and chief creative officer at DM9, he could not take part in deciding which of those four projects should be given the Grand Prix.

Before Icaro left the room, he told the jury he felt, “the Grand Prix should go to work that is truly representative of consumer good, work made for big brands that have invested a lot of bravery to get to this point,” Stephan recounts.

“I thought that was incredibly elegant on his part,” he says, “that he left the room and let the rest of the team determine that, but had clearly expressed his preference that it should go to a massive brand.”

The LePub APAC ECD stresses the jury agreed ‘Plastic Blood’ more than deserves its Gold Lion, and will likely go on to great success later in the week. “Icaro’s work is absolutely groundbreaking. It’s beautiful, and it’s a representation of how much microplastic is in our blood – done in a way that is incredible. It could have easily been a Grand Prix. I thought that, as a jury president, being so elegant and stepping back to allow everyone to decide freely was noteworthy.”

A creative idea that reaches a broad audience for a commercial brand is exactly what Cannes Lions should be awarding, as Stephan (a German who has never lived in Germany) notes, proud of the Grand Prix decision. “I think what’s amazing about that campaign is the fact that both my grandmother and a global CCO recognise equally how good it is. It’s probably the most durable way of explaining to your customers that you care about their everyday concerns – that you understand how hard inflation has hit people and are doing something about it through your own brand. PENNY ‘Price Packs’ is a very worthy winner… It's really a beautiful commitment at the crossroads of creativity and business. That is a very good representation of what the Cannes Lions are.”

A brand with PENNY's scale being awarded a Grand Prix is encouraging for Stephan. “Hopefully, that’s a trend we’ll continue to see – like my former colleagues in Ogilvy Singapore winning the Grand Prix in Health & Wellness with ‘Vaseline Verified’. It’s a huge example of how, when you do something right as a brand, you reap the rewards.”

More broadly, Stephan applauds the leadership Icaro showed in the jury room. “I feel the role of Icaro as president was extremely helpful, because he’s an incredibly brilliant creative and CCO. But also, he made everyone in the room extremely comfortable – because, you know, not everyone is an extrovert – and he really guided everyone through the process.

“I think the first thing that really helped was the cultural context that [the jury’s] diversity brought,” Stephan concludes. “Even in categories like Print & Publishing, which are maybe a little less reliant on case studies and cultural nuance, there’s still an element of it.”