Cresta Awards reveals its 2026 “Of The Year” winners
Cresta Awards announced its Of The Year trophies and special awards, following the release of all winners last week, which saw Oslo independent agency Try take the only two Grand Prix awarded, the final reckoning of accumulated wins sees some familiar names reassert their leadership.
BBDO Worldwide retains the overall Network of the Year title, narrowly pipping Serviceplan for the honor, but the German-based group kept its firm grip on the Independent Network of the Year trophy.
Agency of the Year – perhaps a surprise, given Try’s performance – goes to BigTime Creative Shop of Riyadh. But while Try had two Grand Prix and four Golds, and last year’s winner AMV BBDO had four Golds and a Bronze, BigTime just managed to come out on top with the accumulated points it harvested from two Golds, three Silvers, and seven Bronze awards.
Production Company of the Year was a more straightforward hold for Riff Raff Films.
Riff Raff also picked up one of the prestigious special Jury Chair awards for its EA Skate commercial ‘Drop In’, which was the cornerstone of its multi-trophy success.
Matthew Fone, Founder and Owner of Riff Raff Films, comments:
“It’s hard to win pitches, hard to make things and even harder to make great things that win awards. To win at Cresta is more than special as the jury is semi-permanent so I feel it is even harder to impress them year in year out with what we are doing as a production company. Many thanks to the jury!”
This year’s Jury Chair was Kate Stanners, International Chief Creative Officer at Edelman. She picked out three works for special commendation and comment. Besides the honor to ‘Drop In’, she also highlighted ‘Sheep Happens’ from Serviceplan/plan.net and WingSentry from Horizon FCB in Dubai, an agency that was also among contenders for the Of The Year honors.
Her choices emphasised her interest in innovative creativity that drives earned media, with the choice of ‘Sheep Happens’, a global breakout hit for Penny supermarkets, a campaign built around the surprise visit of a rogue herd of sheep to a store. “Its craft was its speed,” comments Stanners. Somewhat more gentle paced was the inspired harvesting of endangered species data in the ‘WingSentry’ project for client Behavioural Ecology & Conservation Group, which Stanners said was “a beautiful tool that has the power to make real positive change”.
Cresta CEO Lewis Blackwell adds:
“Overall the voting in this year’s competition led to the closest set of accumulated marks we have yet seen when it came to deciding the Of The Year awards. As with all our awards, we go strictly by the logic of what all the votes add up to from our wonderful jurors, and the trophy wins that leads to. Then for the Of The Year wins we assign a consistent points value to the various award levels. This year, we have seen the same old song emerge in some ways, with familiar winners, but there’s definitely a different tune playing!”
Cresta is the Creative Standards organisation. Since 1993 it has benchmarked global creative excellence, recognising ideas that inspire progress and shape the future of communications. Its annual online festival attracts entries from more than 70 countries, covering the full spectrum of skills, from the latest in digital and technology-based communications to traditional advertising and design.
Cresta’s independent jury of leading international industry figures votes individually online, ensuring a fair process free from groupthink. Winners are awarded the distinctive sustainable Cresta trophy, introduced in 2019, and gain international publicity, respected ranking points and visibility through leading industry platforms including Lürzer’s Archive.