AUT Adschool CD Jane Berney writes: “In early July, we received a Just Water Filters International flyer from ceo Tony Falkenstein with a competition for ‘a creative genius to come up with a short word or picture concept that will create the need for customers’ to purchase Just Water filters.
“The problem was the deadline of July 31. I contacted Tony to see if he could push the deadline out so that our Ad Creativity students could have some time to develop ‘genius’ concepts.
Unfortunately, as it was a global challenge and as he had responses from Europe and the USA, Tony felt it was unfair to change the rules and the deadline just for us. And, naturally, we agreed.
“Oh, and did I mention that he was offering up US$15,000 for the winner?
“Several of our students (majoring in Advertising Creativity as part of their third year in their Bachelor of Communication Studies at AUT) decided to participate and we emailed eight submission concepts by 4pm Friday 31 July.
“A fortnight later I received an email from Tony announcing that of all the entries from around the world, three of our student’s submissions placed them in the top 10.
“On August 31 we discovered that one of our student creative teams had won the grand prize with their submission! Caroline Phillips and Michael Tomich will be presented with their cheque for $23,000NZ!!! at Just Water next week.
“This sort of challenge comes to Ad Creativity several times a year, and we offer it up to our students as an opportunity to develop their creative muscles. As they are also managing creative assignments across the semester we try not to overload them.
“They know, by now, that for creatives to rank in the advertising industry, winning of competitions sets them apart and open doors to the agencies that they dream of working for.
“That said, the cash incentive certainly made the winning sweeter! While I believe that most of our students would have participated for the experience alone, I do hope that this reward might help towards eliminating some of their debt.
“Though I do think that there might also be some investment in liquid refreshments!”
The finalists were:
- AUT students Ryan Butler, Kurtis Selby, Michelle Petricevich, Michael Thomas and Carlone Phillips, who have three finalist entries between them
- Thirteen-year-old Caleb Buckley
- Well-known artist Mark Olsen
- Alex Dyer and Kate Foxall
- Felicia Aspelt
- Tony McNeight
- Adam Bilton, who had two designs selected as finalists
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