Every two years, the country’s advertising and marketing industry closes shop. Like salmon, its practitioners make their way to a remote location. For four days, they congregate, press the flesh, stare down the competition and attempt to imbibe creative genius (along with some free alcohol). And surprise! It’s not the Asia-Pacific Advertising Festival. It’s the Philippine Advertising Congress.
To borrow a line from Fortune magazine, AdCon is the biggest ad festival in Asia that no one’s ever heard of. It attracts more delegates than Bangkok’s AdFest, India’s Adman, Singapore’s Creative Circle and Asian Outdoor Advertising Awards, Malaysia’s Kancil, and Indonesia’s Citra Pariwara combined. And foreign observers say its program just crackles with an energy that’s comparable with the Cannes Lions.
By most accounts, this 20th incarnation was the biggest and most successful AdCon so far. Approximately 3,500 traveled to Subic Bay as delegates. Hundreds more followed unofficially, to view the trade exhibition, cheer on their colleagues at the Araw Awards and of course, gatecrash the parties.
All these people milled around the newly finished Subic Convention Center, the largest of its kind in the Philippines. Its two long halls were more than enough to hold both official and unofficial participants. For the first time, it seemed that no one ever had to queue into the session hall.
In commemoration of its 20th year, Program chairmen Susan Dimacali and Pat Go brought in an unprecedented 20 speakers, most of whom were global and regional honchos. On top of that, they invited taipan John Gokongwei, Jr. of Summit Holdings to deliver the keynote address and multi-media author Neil Gaiman as the inspirational speaker. There were so many sessions that coffee breaks were stricken off the program.
Another first for the AdCon was the daily newsletter. Inspired by the Cannes Lions’ bulletins, each issue recapped the previous day’s activities and generated excitement about the day ahead. Moreover, it raised the A-game by surpassing the AdFest’s one-sheet newsletter by six more pages.
Even the ubiquitous trade exhibit buzzed with more activity and more visitors than in previous years. There were interactive displays, exciting games and tons of freebies. This year, the Philippine Star’s two-story café/ business office/paparazzi central towered over all other booths and hogged all the exhibition awards.
Like every AdCon, the events led up to the Araw Awards. BBDO Guerrero Ortega continued to dominate the competition, but it faced new serious competition from Ogilvy & Mather and JWT. KBP inherited the Advertiser Award from Ligo, and Hit Productions became the first radio production outfit to win the Production House Award.
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