The Best Of The Best: OOHMAA ANNOUNCES ‘The Speccies’ Category & Grand Prix 2024 Winners!

The inaugural year of the OOHMAA Awards has been nothing short of incredible! The overwhelming engagement from creative and media agencies has highlighted how much Out of Home resonates as a platform—a space where bold ideas, clever execution, and standout creativity truly come to life.

This first year has set the bar high, showcasing why Out of Home continues to be one of the most impactful advertising platforms—a place where great work isn’t just seen, but truly felt.

Now, it’s time to celebrate the campaigns that made their mark—our 2024 Category winners and the Grand Prix champion!

BEST USE OF TECHNOLOGY/DATA

Advertiser: Green Cross Health - Life Pharmacy

Campaign Title: Awkboards

Creative Agency: FCB

Media Agency: Hearts & Science

Out of Home Format/s: Digital Large Format Billboards

Campaign Details: Life Pharmacy’s Out of Home campaign used transaction data and custom-triggered digital billboards to announce its arrival on Uber Eats—in the most indiscreet way possible. Some pharmacy purchases can be a little awkward, from lubricants to laxatives, but now, the embarrassment isn’t yours—it’s the Uber driver’s. Each time an order was picked up, a highly public digital billboard humorously broadcasted the discreet delivery, letting New Zealanders know they could now skip the awkward checkout and have their essentials delivered straight to their door.

Judges’ Comments: Clever use of data sets from two brands (purchase data from Life Pharmacy and delivery data through Uber Eats) with a humorous twist delivered through the creative. Showcased the strengths of Out of Home but bringing a new spin to existing use cases - with pre-identified embarrassing purchases” triggering the campaign, using time and geotargeted media selection to showcase within specific areas just who was taking advantage of this new capability for Life Pharmacy. Clever and funny, best combination.

BE SEEN

Advertiser: Auto Trader

Campaign Title: Tell New Zealand about your car

Creative Agency: 4AM

Media Agency: Lassoo Media & PR

Out of Home Format/s: Digital Billboards

Campaign Details: This groundbreaking and ongoing Out of Home campaign fuses TV, kiwi creativity, technology, media, and user-generated content. At its core, the campaign magically turns live car listings into entertaining digital billboard advertising. To spark engagement, a brand TVC and brand billboards cleverly drives entries for this unique user-generated billboard campaign. Every fortnight, winners are selected and then ingested into a customised automation platform to create over 100 different billboard designs optimised for all billboard sizes across New Zealand. Programmatically distributed, these live listings tap into people’s desire for 15 minutes of fame, with a media spend often exceeding the value of the car.

Judges’ Comments: I loved the seriousness of this campaign. It’s fun, sure, but they weren’t mucking around; they wanted to be seen, and they were. But it wasn’t just big. It was beautifully crafted - for me, it was head and shoulders above everything else because of this.

Somehow, the design was loud and bold, but not in a way that was ‘shouty’, too in-your-face and naff. Just that subtle angle on the type and the frames of the pictures, the use of a consistent colour to link the campaign to the user-generated executions - which could have been a disaster - all came together to work really well. The language was economical - there wasn’t a word there that didn’t need to be, and of course, being the hero of the campaign, the outdoors linked beautifully with the television, which was a class act in itself. I think we all wish there were more big ‘proper’ campaigns like this.

OUT OF THE BOX

Advertiser: Mercury

Campaign Title: Password is on the back

Creative Agency: FCB

Media Agency: FCB

Out of Home Formats: Digital Large Format Billboards & Classic Street Furniture

Campaign Details: Mercury, one of New Zealand’s biggest energy companies, now does broadband. To let people know we offer internet, we had to let them know we KNOW internet. So we turned one of the biggest billboard’s in the heart of New Zealand’s biggest city, into the world’s biggest modem. And like any internet modem, we put the password on the back. But we didn’t stop there. We turned a series of bus stops into internet hot spots to give kiwis across the country a chance to log onto our Mercury Modems for a chance to win something to take home. Most advertising specialists might say putting your message on the wrong side of the ad was marketing madness, campaign craziness or billboards gone bonkers. But, it worked, with thousands of people (and potential new customers) popping their heads around for a looksie and a log-in.

Judges’ Comments: Mercury’s “Password’s on the Back” campaign is a brilliant example of thinking outside the box. By turning a giant billboard into a modem and bus stops into internet hotspots, they not only caught eyes but also got people actively engaging. The quirky idea of hiding the password on the back was a fun twist that really worked. With hundreds of leads generated, it’s clear this campaign didn’t just stand out—it connected.

BEST USE OF CHANNEL

Advertiser: Auto Trader

Campaign Title: Tell New Zealand about your car

Creative Agency: 4AM

Media Agency: Lassoo Media & PR

Out of Home Format/s: Digital Billboards

Campaign Details: This groundbreaking and ongoing Out of Home campaign fuses TV, kiwi creativity, technology, media, and user-generated content. At its core, the campaign magically turns live car listings into entertaining digital billboard advertising. To spark engagement, a brand TVC and brand billboards cleverly drives entries for this unique user-generated billboard campaign. Every fortnight, winners are selected and then ingested into a customised automation platform to create over 100 different billboard designs optimised for all billboard sizes across New Zealand. Programmatically distributed, these live listings tap into people’s desire for 15 minutes of fame, with a media spend often exceeding the value of the car.

Judges’ Comments: A Seamlessly integrated campaign that cleverly used the value and visibility of Out of Home as the prize to drive audience participation. The modern and consistent visual simplicity, coupled with the humorous copy, made for an engaging and authentic ‘Kiwi’ brand experience across its various stages.

GRAND PRIX WINNER!

Advertiser: Auto Trader

Campaign Title: Tell New Zealand about your car

Creative Agency: 4AM

Media Agency: Lassoo Media & PR

Out of Home Format/s: Digital Billboards

Judges’ Comments: This campaign was a masterclass in seamlessly integrating Out of Home to drive audience participation. It was big, bold, and beautifully crafted—demanding attention without being over the top. The design struck the perfect balance between impact and elegance, with a modern, consistent visual style and sharp, humorous copy that created an authentic Kiwi brand experience. Every element felt intentional, from the subtle design details to the economical use of language.

A massive thank you to our incredible judges—Elaine Gibbons, Megan Smith, Richard Unsworth, and Paul Taylor—for lending their time, expertise, and passion to this year’s awards. Whakawhetai ki a koe!

Of course, a huge congratulations to our 2024 Category winners—your creativity, strategy, and execution continue to push the boundaries of what’s possible in Out of Home.

A special shoutout to our Grand Prix winner – Auto Trader, along with their outstanding agency partners 4AM and Lassoo Media & PR. Their campaign made a huge impact, taking home not just the Grand Prix, but also winning both the Be Seen and Best Use of Channel categories—a testament to their creative and strategic excellence.

Now, who’s next? Q1 2025 nominations open on March 18! If you’ve got a campaign that turned heads, sparked conversation, or set a new standard, get it in before April 10 and show us what great Out of Home looks like. Enter here!