ICF Next, ICF’s (NASDAQ: ICFI) integrated marketing and communications services group, was honored with six awards at this year’s Innovation SABRE awards, making it the second-most-awarded agency of the evening. The agency won two awards apiece for its work on Skittles and Heinz, and additional awards for campaigns for Jim Beam and Reynolds.
Skittles’ “Exclusive the Rainbow” campaign was also a finalist for the evening’s biggest award, Best in Show. In the six-year history of the Innovation SABRE Awards, ICF Next has won the show’s top honor three times, and has been named a finalist three times (as Olson Engage).
“[The campaign] found a way for Skittles to be as high-profile as previous years without shelling out $5 million to run a spot at [The Big Game],” the judges commented, adding that the “amazing campaign” demonstrated “the power of earned media,” a “big risk zigging while everyone else is zagging.”
Part of the Holmes Report’s SABRE (Superior Achievement in Branding, Reputation and Engagement) Awards, the Innovation SABREs recognize “insight and innovation” in digital and social media, data and analytics and content creation in all its forms. According to organizers, this year’s event drew a record number of entries.
Heading into the show, ICF Next campaigns were shortlisted 20 times, more than any other agency. And it won in a broad range of categories, ranging from “Best Content Creation for Media Sites” (Jim Beam) to “Best Use of Social Networks” (Heinz Mayochup) as well as for “Micromarketing” (Reynolds), among others.
“Great agency brands are built primarily on great client work, which makes this national recognition particularly meaningful this year as we launch ICF Next," said John Armstrong, president of ICF Next. "We’re grateful to have industry-leading talent, and brave clients who trust us to push their brands forward.”
ICF Next brings together ICF’s global award-winning marketing, communications and associated technology expertise, offering clients a full set of capabilities in strategy and transformation, insight and analytics, creative engagement, technology and channels and loyalty and customer marketing. Read more about ICF Next.
