Middle East Ad Festival Strips Shop of Agency-of-Year Title

April 2nd, 2009 Tom Okeefe

samsung

Top Winner FP7 Doha Submitted Raft of Ghost Ads to Dubai Lynx Awards

NEW YORK (AdAge.com) — The organizers of the Dubai Lynx Awards have stripped the most-awarded agency at last month’s Middle East awards festival of its Agency of the Year title and seven prizes for work that turned out to be scam ads for Samsung, Nissan and a product called Higeen Mouthwash. The agency, FP7 Doha, is part of the Middle East Communication Networks, owned 51% by Interpublic Group of Cos., and works closely with McCann Erickson in the Middle East.

The Dubai festival is done by the Cannes Lions International Advertising Festival organization. After the festival ended last month, local bloggers in the Middle East claimed the ads entered by FP7 were fakes and the festival did a more comprehensive investigation.

Scam ads are an ongoing problem at awards shows around the world, and it’s not that unusual for a winner or two to be thrown out during or even after a festival, but the sheer scale of FP7’s ill-gotten gains makes this one of the most rampant cases of festival fakery.

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  • You know what— I don't even care. Some of the best work I've ever done has ended up on the cutting room floor. If the ads didn't run, it was likely because of shy clients that wanted to play it safe. There are several award shows out there for ads that didn't run. They should enter those. Regardless, they're probably getting more millage out of getting the boot than they did from winning the award.

    Think about it, did you cover the winner of the Dubai Lynx Awards before this incident?

    My 2¢.
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