All of the winners from The Drum Awards for PR 2023

Taking home the top prize, the Grand Prix, is Hope&Glory for its ‘The Last Photo’ campaign for Campaign Against Living Miserably (Calm).

Supporting Calm, Adam&EveDDB and ITV, it helped create a photography exhibition on London’s Southbank – a poignant outdoor gallery displaying smiling photos taken in the last days of 50 people’s lives in the UK.

Unveiled by Strictly Come Dancing’s Shirley Ballas, whose brother’s photo features in the campaign, along with reality TV stars and Calm ambassadors Jamie Laing and Amber Gill, it showed the stark and often misunderstood aspects of suicidal behavior, sending the message that suicide doesn’t always look suicidal. Aiming to equip the nation with the tools they need to help prevent suicide, it combats the stark reality that although 125 people a week die by suicide in the UK, as many as 61% would struggle to tell if someone they knew felt suicidal.

Announcing the story with commissioned research, talent interviews, photography, influencer and social support that created a wave of awareness, Hope&Glory landed blanket national coverage, with stand-out pieces across The Independent, The Metro, The Daily Mirror, The Daily Express and The Telegraph in print. It also generated a raft of regionals and consumer media, including The Evening Standard, Cosmo, Grazia and Joe.com the likes of and broadcasts, including a segment on This Morning followed by the Calm advert.

Every piece of coverage, content and image caption directed people to Calm’s website, compelling people to talk more openly or seek out support via the helpline and front-line care.

The recipient of the Chair’s Award, meanwhile, as chosen by head judges Elaine Wong of Comcast and John Mayne of Dentsu, Ogilvy UK for its work with Dove.

The Unilever-owned brand, after more than two decades of campaigning, is well known by the public as a champion of real beauty. Its mission is to redefine beauty standards and help everyone experience beauty and body image positively.

Social media has had face-altering augmented reality filters since 2015 and most of them are harmless. With the advent of generative AI, however, the Bold Glamour filter took augmentation dramatically and dangerously forward. It even worked with a hand in front of a user’s face, making it impossible to tell if someone was using the filter.

This unlocked the creative idea for Ogilvy. The only way for a filter not to distort your face was for it to not ‘see’ your face, so it asked people to turn their backs.

The ‘Turn Your Back’ campaign used a rapid response, multi-channel media strategy to turn the tide against the harmful Bold Glamour TikTok filter.

Within 72 hours of the Bold Glamour filter trending, Dove activated 68 influencers, including actor Gabrielle Union, who took the campaign to The Oscars, turning her back on the red carpet.

The campaign reached over 1 billion in earned media and led to a leading influencer agency publicly condemning the ‘Bold Glamour’ filter.

Earned media also helped deliver an increase in brand consideration and purchase intent in the UK and US.

Wong and Mayne were joined on the judging panel this year by senior marketers from top brands, including United Airlines, Lego, Danone and Ikea.

Among the other big winners of the night are Golin for its work with Premier Inn, Frank PR for its work with Weetabix and Weber Shandwick for its work with eBay.

You can read the full list of winners below and read the stories behind the winning work over on our Case Studies hub.

• Grand Prix: Hope&Glory for Calm

• Chair Award: Ogilvy UK for Dove Unilever

• Consumer Goods: The Romans for Dove

• Crisis: Bospar for San Francisco Pride

• Media and Entertainment: Weber Shandwick for eBay UK

• Content: Golin for Premier Inn

• Events or Live Activations: Hope&Glory for Calm

• Storytelling: The Romans for Dove

• Retail: Hope&Glory for Ikea and Shelter

• Social Influencers: The Romans for Estrid

• Small Budget: Frank PR for Weetabix

• Media Relations: Hope&Glory for Calm and Tin Man for Virgin Atlantic

• Automotive: Kindred for ZenAuto

• B2B: Ogilvy UK for Insmarsat

• Innovation: Fanclub for Emma

• Integrated: Hope&Glory for Calm

• Social Media: Ogilvy UK for Dove Unilever

• Launch or Relaunch: WongDoody for Both&

• Not-For-Profit, Charity and Government: Hope&Glory for Calm

• International: The Lego Group & Golin for The Lego Group

• Sponsorship or Brand Partnership: Cartwheel and Co Marketing for NBCUniversal Media

• Public Affairs: Brands2Life for Pragmatic

• PR For Good: Hope&Glory for Calm

• Food and Drink: Ogilvy UK for Hellmann’s

• Consumer Services: The Romans for Livi UK

• Healthcare and Pharma: Thunder11 for Northwell Health

• Data and Insights: Daniel J Edelman for Haleon

• Travel, Leisure and Sport: The Romans for Wiggle x Adidas

• Leader of the Year: Amy Irvine, Digitaloft

• Brand/In-House Team of the Year: The Global Lego Retail PR team

• Agency Team of the Year: Brands2Life

The Drum Awards for PR took place at The Drum Labs, our very own bar, event and film studio in central London. You can rewatch all of our Awards shows so far over on The Drum TV.