NEW YORK – Philippine-based agency TBWA\Santiago Mangada Puno bagged a coveted Webby Award for their Bench “Feels” campaign under the Fashion & Beauty category at the 21st Annual Webby Awards. The awarding ceremony took place at Cipriani Wall Street on May 16th, with Mark Bustos himself on hand to accept the award for TBWA\SMP and Bench.
The characteristically humble Bustos shared via Twitter that he was proud of “Feels”, citing his main reason for accepting the collaboration was to help his charity and further his advocacy, saying, “You do the right thing because it’s the right thing to do.”
“Feels” served as a launch video for Bench Barbers, a new venture catering to the modern aspirational gentlemen. For this, the renowned Philippine lifestyle brand collaborated with acclaimed hairstylist and humanitarian, Mark Bustos to create an unlikely experience—a haircut so unique, even a blind man could appreciate it.
The win came after last month’s announcement of three shortlist nods for TBWA\SMP, with the agency’s work, “Archimedes Trejano,” being recognized as a Webby Nominee in the Individual Short category, placing it among the five best Online Film & Video entries in the world. At the same time, the TBWA SMP’s collaboration with ABS-CBN Foundation, “Dirty Watercolor”, was named an official Webby Honoree.
Known as “The Internet’s highest honor”, this year’s edition of the Webby Awards was the largest-ever in the event’s history, receiving 3.5 million votes for 13,000 entries from 70 countries across 100 categories.
