MDS End of Year Show last Friday attracts an abundance of creative directors

CCOs, ECDs, CDs, ACDs, CDs, whatever the title, it was heartening to see so many industry creatives (both with or without the lofty titles) all cramming in together into the Upstairs Bar at Tallulah to check out the AdSchool’s student portfolios.

Says Kate Humphries, programme director, AdSchool: “With so many of you in the same room at once, some had to patiently wait their turn to see the books, so a big thank you to all those CDS including Lisa Fedyszyn, Jonno McMahon, Stu Mallarkey, Dave Shirley, Tom Johnson, Matty Burton, Gary Steele, Haydn Kerr, Freddie Coltart, Rory McKechnie, Simon Vicars, Hadleigh Sinclair, Duncan Bone, Nick Worthington, Toby Talbot, Kristal Knight, Damon Stapleton, Christie Cooper, Mick Stalker, Angus Hennah, Scott Maddocks, Matt Sellars, Rich Robson and Will McDonald (standing in for Sam Stuchbury) for coming along to do more work after work on a rainy Thursday evening.

“For creating a situation in which there were more CDs per pound than MDS has ever had in the one room before, some congrats are in order for Phoebe Rooney & Bella Griffiths, the team who came up with the classified invites to the show (and thanks once again to Graeme Dolan and Margaret Hawker from NZME for helping to making that invite happen). Other congrats also to Anja Pienaar & David Gillard, the team behind the client reminder for agencies to come to the show, and to clients Annemarie Browne (chief marketing officer, Lotto NZ); Glen Gibbons (creative director, Kathmandu); Ally Young (brand marketing, Spark NZ), and Michael Wood, (head of brand and marketing, Frank Energy) a big thank you for being such good sports by ‘strongly encouraging’ your agencies to attend our show.

“A huge cheer to the mentors that helped every one of our students to sharpen up their thinking over the last 10 weeks, you are too numerous to mention here, but you know who you are, and every single one of you is a legend.

“And a standing ovation to our final industry panel of Corey Chalmers (Young & Shand), Christie Cooper, James Conner, Liz Richards, Nick Dellabarca (The Monkeys), Rory Mckechnie, Wihan Meerholz (DDB Aotearoa), Ashwin Gopal (TBWA), Anna Yates (Stanley St), Tim Gavriel, and Aaron Carbines (FCB) for whipping through all the portfolios last week and giving such invaluable feedback.

“Anyone who missed out on the show please message me at kate.humphries@mediadesignschool.com and I’ll send a few portfolios through.”