Goafest 2011 announced; includes two-day special initiative with ASCI

Advertising Agencies Association of India (AAAI) and The Advertising Club Bombay (ACB) have finally smoked the peace pipe, and came together to officially announce the sixth edition of Goafest 2011. This year, the festivities will be on for five days, from April 5 to 9, 2011 at Zuri White Sands in South Goa. Based on this year's theme for the fest, “Ideas are all around you, can you SPOT one?”, the organising committee has planned series of initiatives to engage participants all throughthe five days.

Lynn de Souza, Chairperson, Goafest 2011, said, “Goafest 2011 will provide a unique learning environment for creative, marketing and media practitioners and the opportunity to recognize and award excellent work from all over the country. We hope to take this event onto newer heights and bring it on par with other international events.”

The festival will kick off with a two-day event featuring 100 young creative people, organised in association with ASCI. They will be required to conceive and execute installation art works based on the theme ‘Creativity with a conscience’. The final pieces will be displayed in the Ad Village for the duration of the festival. To be held on April 7, the topic for the industry Advertising Conclave this year is ‘Preparing the profession for the new decade’ and will be led by Sundar Swamy.

Representing ASCI, Subhash Kamath, managing partner, BBH, said, “Till now ASCI has been focusing on the consumers side, and it was felt that there should be a proactive measure from the council in engaging with the community to create responsible advertising. Goafest is the biggest platform available for the advertising community, and so this was a natural fit to engage with them.”

As part of the main festival, seminars and panel discussions are scheduled on April 8 and 9. Some of the confirmed speakers at this year's event include Amos Pizzey, president and creative director, Talent House, Peter Scott, chief executive officer, Engine (ex WCRS), Michael Wall, chief executive officer, Lowe and Partners WW, Susan Clark, chief marketing officer, Economist, Laurie Coots, chief marketing officer, TBWA, Shailesh Rao, president, JAPAC, Google, Charlie Crowe, founder, The Festival of Media and Brian J Terkelsen, president, LiquidThread, Starcom MediaVest Group.

The Abby’s start with the Media Awards on April 8, followed by the Creative Awards on April 9. The creative and media Abby’s will be managed by the Awards Governing Council (AGC) under the Chairmanship of Shashi Sinha. The AGC is a nine member committee with eminent personalities including Arvind Sharma, Sundar Swamy, Sunil Lulla, Ajay Chandwani, Ajay Kakkar, Suman Srivastava, the President of AAAI Nagesh Alai and the President of ACB BhaskarDas.

Sinha noted that the AGC will announce the categories of awards and jury members. It is understood that the categories and verticals for the awards will more or less remain the same. “The judging process has gone for an overhaul with two rounds of judging held for some of the key categories. First round of judging will be held in Bombay followed by the second round in Goa closer to the date of the the awards evening,” he added.

This year, The Festival of Media, Montreux, will specially host two of its categories ‘Best communication strategy’ and ‘Best contribution to a campaign by a media owner’ at the Goafest at specially reduced entry fees. The winners and runners-up of these categories will be fast-tracked into the Festival of Media finals.

Online registration for this year's festival will start from February 21, 2011, with delegate fee set at Rs. 11,000/- for professionals above the age of 30, Rs. 5,500/- for professionals under 30. Fee for international delegates is set at Rs. 25,000/-.