In front of the thousand or so creatively dressed creative community members that attended Boston’s 46th Francis W. Hatch Awards last night – hosted by KISS 108’s Billy Costa – at the newly renovated Back Bay Events Center, Boston’s Arnold took home 89 awards including the evening’s Best of Show award. Following Arnold with 42 awards was Hill Holliday. Mullen took home 22, Fort Franklin, 14 and Modernista!, 12. Dunkin Donuts was named Marketer of the Year partially in recognition of its America Runs On Dunkin marketing program.
As with all advertising related events, there was liquor and lots of it. Following a two hour cocktail party, attendees were properly sloshed by the time the awards began and much hooting and hollering could be heard throughout the auditorium as each agency won their respective awards. Particularly busy was Arnold having to applaud for itself 89 times throughout the show. That’s them in the picture to the right. Oops. We’re told this is the Mullen crew. not Arnold. Sorry.
Just as liquor prevails at advertising events, so do hotly-clad women appearing for the sole purpose of drawing attention to whatever it is they are promoting. This year’s hotties came dressed as she devils complete with horns, mini skirts and black stockings. They were there along with “humor, news + nightlife” weekly dig publisher Chris Rohland to present the “Work We Dig Award.” Chris looks very happy with his lady friends here, doesn’t he?
After the awards were over, there was the After Party with the band Big City Rock to attend which served up a much needed food break after having watch about four hours of self-aggrandizing self-congratulation. Thankfully, there were no fist bumps in sight. Though Captains of Industry’s Dr. Clark was there to share wit, wonder and wisdom accumulated after many years in the business.
After the After Party, it was off to a couple Boston Bars – the Rattlesnake and another whose name eludes – with the crew from Boston’s Barbarian Group, the real and unfortunately unglorified muscle behind the famous Subservient Chicken. Barbarian Group did the work. Crispin got the glory. That’s just how it goes in this business. Anyway, the very creatively dressed creative Geoffrey Lillemon was also in the house as was the lovely Eva McCloskey from Barbarian Group
Special thanks goes out to Conover Tuttle Pace’s Jason Howarth who invited us to the event. Much appreciation for getting us to Boston and out on the town. Had we chose not to attend, we’d probably be locked away writing about some crappy viral campaign that no one will see yet the agency insists upon calling viral.
You can see more images and videos (that don’t seem to work) of the event here.
