BBDO loses 3 Abbys; DDB Mudra work under scanner

GoaFest 2013 is definitely living up to its tag line ‘Just what you unexpected’. ET reported on Wednesday that the Awards Governing Council was investigating an allegation of plagiarism against BBDO’s work for DHL – on Thursday, the AGC decided to strip the ads of the awards they’d won – one gold in Print, and one gold and a silver in Outdoor.

But even as the governing body was trying to get to the bottom of the DHL case, another allegation of plagiarism was levied, this time against a DDB Mudra campaign for Electrolux, which bagged a total of two silvers — one in Print and another in Outdoor — at the Creative Abbys.

The creative in question, with a tagline “Keep them new with Fabriguard drum” uses the very same concept as a campaign for LG washing machines, Y&R, Sao Paulo, Brazil in April 2012. The LG tagline is “Clothes as clean as new ones”.

The similarities between the two campaigns were brought to the Award Governing Council’s (AGC) notice on Thursday, at which point the AGC decided to ask the print and outdoor juries to vote on the course of action.

The juries voted to withdraw the metals from the BBDO work for DHL. At the time of going to press, they were still to come to a decision on the Electrolux campaign.

Speaking to ET, Shashi Sinha, chairperson, Awards Governing council, GoaFest 2013 said: “We are disheartened with what is happening, but this is good for GoaFest Creative Abbys in the long run. It will clean up the process.”

Josy Paul, chairman & CCO, BBDO, said, “We find the decision of the AGC ridiculous! Take a look at our track record — the only agency in Asia to win a creative-effectiveness Lion at Cannes. The ‘O’ in BBDO is ‘Originality’.” Sonal Dabral, chairman & CCO, DDB Mudra, refused to comment on the issue.