Jureeporn Thaidumrong tops CB Asia poll of leading Chief Creative Officers to find Asia’s Creative Director of the Year for 2018

Every year at the end of the calendar year there is always an array of end of year awards handed out at the various country and regional award shows and awards presentations. These are mostly based on slick document presentations prepared and submitted by the slick regional PR departments of the top regional networks.

In amongst the dozens and dozens of awards handed out, some worthy winners were recognised. As were, in Campaign Brief Asia’s opinion, some less worthy “WTF?” winners.

So Campaign Brief Asia turned to a panel of senior and respected creative leaders to gauge their thoughts.

We polled 12 of today’s leading creative leaders with these 3 questions below to find the worthy winners for the categories – Creative Director of the Year, Emerging Creative Leader of the Year and Campaign Of The Year.

Creative Director of the Year

Who is the CCO/ECD/Creative Leader that you believe has really stood out over 2018?

Emerging Creative Leader of the Year

Who is the creative director that you feel has shown the potential to grow into one of the region’s future creative leaders?

Campaign Of The Year

The campaign (award-winning or not) that you admire from 2018? The one that you would be proud to have your name on.

The results of our Campaign Brief Asia survey sees Jureeporn Thaidumrong, Chief Creative Officer at GREYnJ United Bangkok come out on top as Asia’s Creative Director of the Year for 2018.

Thaidumrong (pictured at top of story) and GREYnJ United have experienced great success over the past 12 months and Thaidumrong was a clear winner in our poll.

As one CCO commented: I have always respected Judee’s humor, insights, unique way of showing women in her advertising through the years. When the industry started doubting Thai advertising when it had a “lull” in award shows, I never doubted Judee’s leadership and creativity. I just knew she’ll rise again, making her country proud once more.”

Runner-Up for the award is Joji Jacob (pictured left – CCO at BLK J Singapore) who has enjoyed tremendous success in the Singapore market with the agency he co-founded, BLK J Singapore, taking out a couple of local Agency of the Year gongs.

Finalists from our survey were Kazoo Sato (CCO at TBWA\Hakuhodo Tokyo), Ted Lim (CCO of Dentsu Brand Agencies, APAC), Reed Collins (CCO at Ogilvy North Asia) and Melvin Mangada (CCO at TBWA\Santiago Mangada Puno Philippines).

It was a double win for GREYnJ Bangkok with their highly awarded Kasikornbank K-Bank “Friendshit” campaign named Asia’s Campaign Of The Year for 2018. This also was was clear decision with “Friendshit” attracting more than double the votes of the next nomination.

GREYnJ United partnered with Kasikornbank to launch ‘Friendshit’, a case study on leveraging trademark storytelling to narrate a universal truth. Featuring the socially-awkward Hui, who finds it a daily uphill challenge to make friends and ingratiate herself into mainstream society, the spot weaves in the K Plus app as a mechanism the teens leverage as a platform to break the ice with people from all walks of life.

The Runner Up for the award is Greenpeace “Dead Whale” from Dentsu JaymeSyfu Philippines. The campaign featured an installation of a 73-foot decomposing “Dead Whale” on the shores of one of the most polluted cities in the Philippines during the 2017 ASEAN Summit. The whale was created using plastic wastes collected from the ocean. The campaign results included over 100 million impressions internationally and it caught the attention of ASEAN leaders, which put Coastal and Marine Protection in the proposal for the next Summit.

There were two finalists in this category – IKEA “Human Catalogue” (BBH Singapore) and KFC “Hot & Spicy” (Ogilvy Hong Kong).

The third category in our poll of 12 of the region’s most respected creative leaders sees Cheil Worldwide Hong Kong’s CCO Paul Chan (pictured left) rise to the top as Asia’s Emerging Creative Leader of the Year for 2018.

Chan beat a talented group of emerging creative leaders including runner up in the survey, Hemant Shringy ECD at BBDO India.

Finalists were: Yoshihiro Yagi (Dentsu Tokyo), Richard Wu (ADK Taiwan), Terence Leong (R/GA China), Veradis Vinyaratn (TBWA Thailand) and Raj Das (CCO Leo Burnett India)

2018 Asia Creative Director of the Year

Jureeporn Thaidumrong (CCO GREYnJ United Bangkok)

Runner-Up

Joji Jacob (CCO at BLK J Singapore)

Finalists

Ted Lim (CCO of Dentsu Brand Agencies, APAC)

Reed Collins (CCO at Ogilvy North Asia)

Kazoo Sato (CCO at TBWA\Hakuhodo Tokyo)

Melvin Mangada (CCO at TBWA\Santiago Mangada Puno Philippines)

2018 Asia Emerging Creative Leader of the Year

Paul Chan

Runner Up

Hemant Shringy (BBDO India)

Finalists

Yoshihiro Yagi (Dentsu Tokyo)

Richard Wu (ADK Taiwan)

Terence Leong (R/GA China)

Veradis Vinyaratn (TBWA Thailand)

Raj Das (Leo Burnett India)

2018 Asia Campaign Of The Year

Kasikornbank K-Bank “Friendshit”

Runner Up

Greenpeace “Dead Whale”

IKEA “Human Catalogue”

KFC “Hot & Spicy”

Don’t miss the best of Asia’s creative and award news. Sign up for the free Campaign Brief Asia Daily email newsletter. It takes just 30 seconds. CLICK HERE.