First Published by Adweek.com
A tennis star playing against former versions of himself won multiple honors at this year’s Clio Awards, including two Grand Clios.
“McEnroe vs. McEnroe,” by FCB New York for Michelob Ultra, won Grand Clio Awards for Branded Entertainment & Content, as well as Creative Use of Data. The campaign pitted the real John McEnroe against AI versions of himself as a younger player as part of the beer brand’s “It’s Only Worth It If You Enjoy It” campaign.
In addition to the campaign win, FCB New York was also named Agency of the Year at the Clio Awards show Tuesday, which was hosted by Anthony Anderson.
Also winning big was a campaign for another beer brand, Corona, which took home Grand Clios for “Corona Plastic Fishing Tournament” in Direct: Product/Service, Experience/Activation: Product/Service and Public Relations: Product/Service for agency We Believers. Corona was also awarded Advertiser of the Year, while We Believers took the Independent Agency of the Year title.
The Ogilvy network took home several Grand Clios, including for “Morning After Island” by Ogilvy Honduras for Grupo Estratégico PAE, a group that advocates for reproductive rights in Honduras. The campaign won for Public Relations: Public Service, Out of Home: Public Service and Direct: Public Service.
Ogilvy was named Network of the Year, while Smuggler took home the Production Company of the Year prize.
Other Grand Clio Award winners included VMLY&R, McCann Worldgroup India, Ogilvy Brazil, Impact BBDO, Serviceplan Germany and Virtual Worldwide for the “Backup Ukraine” campaign for Polycam and Unesco.
Highlights from the show also included an announcement that Pepsi will be partnering with the Clio Awards on the 2024 Pepsi Emerging Creative Award competition, which will launch in September of this year and be presented on stage at next year’s awards show.
Also presented on stage was the inaugural Jodi Harris Honorary Clio Award. Created in memory of Harris, who served as AB InBev’s global vice president of marketing culture and capabilities until her death in May 2022, the award honors clients who create a culture that allows creativity to thrive. The award was presented to Harris’ husband, Jordan Harris, by Ricardo Marques, vp of marketing at Michelob Ultra, and Susan Credle, global chief creative officer of FCB Global.