AD STARS 2019: What Went On Behind the Design & Print Jury Session

BUSAN, SOUTH KOREA ⁠— One of the biggest international advertising award festivals is AD STARS held every year in Busan, a port city found at South Korea. For five straight years now, the non-profit festival has been receiving more than ten thousand entries from different agencies and brands hoping to win big and get the coveted top awards as well as grants that come along with them. This year, 220 preliminary judges sifted through 20,645 entries and reached a shortlist comprised of 1,652 finalists.

The final jury sessions were handled by 40 judges, held within the week as panel members arrived in Busan. We caught up with Melvin Mangada, Managing Partner and Chief Creative Officer of TBWA\Santiago Mangada Puno, who shares with adobo magazine his experiences as the Executive Judge who led the Design and Print jury.

“The organizers said that in the Design and Print jury, we had the most entries, 78 finalists in Design and 85 in print, roughly more than 1/4 of the 500+ finalists,” Mangada says.

Check out what happened during his session: