France’s most famous southern seaside town is buzzing this week as nearly 30,000 entries from around the globe vie for the ultimate in advertising kudos.

With five shortlisted campaigns out of 57 in the Direct category, it was Colenso’s Doggelganger that earned the agency a bronze for the Pedigree Adoption Drive. Riffing on the adage that dogs and their owners often resemble each other, its website uses face mapping software to pair people with their canine double.

Meanwhile, Colenso scored another bronze lion in the Promo + Activation group with its Westpac Impulse Saver concept (it also held the lion’s share of local shortlisted campaigns, with three finalists to Ogilvy and DDB’s one each).

Romania’s McCann Erickson took out the grand prix in both classes for Kandia Dulce, which re-envisioned a chocolate bar as a typically cheesy all-American product with Bruce Springsteen soundtrack.

Our hopes for a PR award now hang on Colenso’s Rear View Girls viral video, which turned out to be an ad for Levi jeans, and DDB’s ‘Bags to Billboards’ campaign, which leveraged Cadbury’s sponsorship of the Kiwi Commonwealth Games team by turning 27 billboards with messages of public support into bags for the athletes to take to Delhi.

Tomorrow we’ll find out how Colenso and Ogilvy fare in Outdoor. With three entries each, they managed to edge out our Aussie counterparts with their measly four in total, and on Thursday the Press Lions will be revealed, where Colenso again dominates with four nods for their DB Beer campaign.

Launch party schmoozers were treated to a viewing of the first episode of Penguins of Madagascar after a powhiri welcome. Special guests included Supermayor Len Brown, Dr Wayne Mapp, minister of research, science and technology and Nickelodeon Animation Studios senior vice president and general manager Mark Taylor.

Oktobor and Backyard presented a proposal to Nickelodeon earlier this year and the long-term contract ensures full-time work at Oktobor for its 80 current staff, which will increase to 120 by mid-2011. Oktobor’s managing director Bruce Everett anticipates the studio will provide up to 300 jobs over the next four years and will offer several paid internships to top CG graduates of NZQA institutions nationwide. There’s even talk there might not be enough talent to fill the upcoming demand.

“The Post, Digital and Visual Effects rebate has been a key economic driver in helping us bring this business into the Auckland area,” Everett says. “We have received invaluable assistance from the Ministry of Economic Development, as well as input from New Zealand Film Commission and Film New Zealand in order to make this business opportunity viable.”

So the future is certainly a bit brighter for NZ’s animati digerati and for students wanting to enter the industry. Everett is confident that “Oktobor Animation will become a hub for Nickelodeon’s rising number of CG productions, giving Auckland a major international presence in the growing longform CG animation industry … and will also create a much-needed identity for the growing pool of CG artists in the Auckland region.”

Oktobor is owned by Omnilab Media, Australia and New Zealand’s largest, privately owned media production and content development business, and managing director Christopher Mapp is also determined to put Auckland on the world animation stage.

“Oktobor Animation is inspired by the success of Weta, whose success is owed in part to the strong commitment made by the New Zealand government to incentivise international producers to bring their films to the region. We believe there is a substantial opportunity to extend this success to the television VFX and animation arena by establishing Auckland as the viable and competitive production hub.”

Skipper, Kowalski, Rico and Private may live in Central Park Zoo, but their roots are now set to be 100% pure New Zealand.

For even more Oktoborfest, Campbell Live talked to a few of the main protagonists at the opening.

Who for: Vodafone
Why we like it: Tech meets Tchaikovsky. Geeky dedication writ large.

And you can watch the making of it too.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Mad Men muppets! Can’t wait for their next spoof.

We had many excellent entries in our Finish the line cartoon contest, thanks for your wit. We’re spreading the love (beer, actually) with two winners.

From Philip O’Neill: Actually I’m in charge of subscriber-only content at NBR.
From Mike Hutcheson: No I’m an Art Director, that’s why I cant spell “hearsay”.

And the winner of the John Key competition is Wayne McDougall. Our pic showed John Key in a construction site, holding up a blank white t-shirt. Wayne’s caption was: Throw anything you like. With my poll ratings, nothing sticks.

A box of Steinlager Edge for you all.

And these lucky people were chosen at random from the StopPress newsletter mail list to win more prizes!

Winners of a bottle of Russian Standard Vodka are:
Toni Knowles, Dominic O’Hare, John Schofield, Glenn Robson, Isaac Thackray.

Winners of Mad Men season 1 and 2 DVDs are:
Peter Hampton, Michelle O’Donnell, David Collier, Dallas Fisher, Kate Wilkinson.

Pip pip hooray.

• What percentage of 13-year-olds have mobile phones? You’ll smack your gob in disbelief.
• Why do you need to be on LinkedIn?
• Hitwise Lifestyle slices and dices Kiwi web traffic for our corporate consumption.
• Size does matter – Aussie marketers talk up 2010 budgets.

Read all about it. MediaMonitor 27-Oct-09

Only seven agencies won Caxtons, out of 17 that were dished out. Topping the winners’ circle is DDB NZ with four awards, all for Sky TV ‘Alien vs Predator’. It ate the competition in these categories: Best Campaign, Media/Entertainment/Telco/IT, Best Art Direction and Best Photography.

Brisbane’s SapientNitro took out three awards for Tourism Queensland ‘Best job in the world’: the Quinlivan Black Award, Travel/Leisure and Best Small Space Ad.

Marketforce and 303, both from Perth, also won hat-tricks.

Download the winners’ booklet here. 2009 Caxton Awards

Several graphic and multimedia artists created original artwork to help illustrate the ‘heroes’ and what makes them spark. The images are effectively digitally projected on the sides of buildings.

The theme song is the gospel classic This Little Light of Mine, reworked by Peter van der Fluit of Liquid Studios (and ex Screaming Meemee). It’s a cute rendition that will be either imitated profusely or become profusely irritating after multiple exposure.

Telecom has created a website to celebrate its “new identity” that’s “more than just a logo”. Visit www.lightofmine.co.nz to see the ad and the making of. You also have a chance to win your object of desire that represents your passion.

Lukins left NZ in 1997 with an MA in Art History, and planned to do a two-year OE stint in Europe. Thirteen years later, she’s made London her home and loving it. She first worked in investment banking for six years before manoeuvring into digital marketing and landing a plumb role at Selfridges as web marketing manager. “In that role that I discovered that I enjoyed working in retail – with my extensive shopping habit I certainly had an affinity for retail marketing concepts!” says Lukins.

Two years later she joined High St fashion and homeware retailer Bhs as web marketing manager. One of her roles was to launch its eCommerce website.

Since June 2008 she’s been at Westfield directing its digital marketing strategies. The company opened a shopping centre in Shepherd’s Bush a year ago with 265 luxury retailers; there are six other Westfields in the UK and another one on the way in Stratford City, adjacent to the 2012 Olympic Games venue.

Lukins manages the team that runs all of Westfield’s online activity including websites, blogs, email marketing and social media as well as in-centre interactive directories.

Here’s Lukins’ low-down on the future of digital marketing:

“Since June we have been building up our presence on social media as I see this as a hugely important means of connecting with our customers. We now have 28,000 Facebook fans – the majority are under 20 years of age – and although right now this group is not the biggest in terms of their spending-power, they are our shoppers of the future.

This age group have told us that they don’t really bother reading emails from retailers anymore, they like to consume their information via social media, particularly Facebook, so it’s important for us that we start to build a relationship with these customers now, using the medium they prefer.

The other digital marketing trend that gets talked about a lot in the UK is the potential for mobile marketing. Currently, there is still a perception from customers that mobile marketing is an intrusive nuisance. However, I do believe that once we have a significant percentage of smart phone usage in the market and genuinely useful time- and money-saving applications, consumers will start to use their mobiles for information on the go. I will be continuing to monitor this market and hopefully find the right mobile hook for Westfield.
”

Know any expats in the marcomms biz who can give us an update on industry trends overseas? Write to editor@stoppress.co.nz.

Of course, social media is in there, as well as the importance of trademarking, mobile marketing and ethical consumerism.

It’s sober, essential reading. Visit www.trendsinbranding.com.

Salt’s Top 10 Branding Trends:

1. Branding in a recession
2. Befriending a brand
3. Naming by numbers
4. The best defense is a strong offense
5. Inspired in America
6. We know where you are
7. Intelligent design
8. Be careful what you ask for
9. Show them you care
10. The perfect match