Creative agency MetropolitanRepublic Uganda Ltd last night basked in glory as they were crowned agency of the year at the Uganda Marketing Excellence Awards (UMEAS). Metro, as they are commonly referred to in the marketing circles, came top of other agencies like Fireworks Advertising, Zeus the Agency, who took the rising agency of the year.
The winners in different categories were picked by a jury of 6 consisiting of Dr Benedict Mugerwa, the Head professional courses at Uganda Management Institute, UMI), Ngulumi Immaculate Nabatte (Chief Manager of Marketing an Branding, Centenary Bank), John Paul Okwi (Senior Manager events and Sponsorships, MTN Uganda and the Jury President), Rogers Anguzu (Commercial Director, Crown Beverages Ltd) Barbra Arimi Teddy (Head Marketing and communications, NSSF), as well as Jackie Namara, (CEO IguruConsult Ltd).
The UMEAS organised by Evolve Africa aims at giving brands, agencies and marketers an opportunity to showcase their marketing success and amplify the quality of their businesses. The awards span all aspects of the marketing profession, including; Communications, Advertising and Public Relations.
They explore how well brands, marketers and their agency partners have leveraged different media channels, digital and traditional, to create campaigns that have made a powerful impact on their target audiences, and businesses.
The UMEAS 2023 sponsors are I&M Bank Uganda, Daily Monitor, KFM, NTV, Spark TV, NSSF, Equity Bank, Kampala Serena Hotel, UDB, Radio City, Matooke Republic, Kadanke Brand House, Wango App and Centenary Bank.
The selection of Metro as the year’s best comes just a week after the agency took home seven awards in the Silverbacks Awards. The agency is behind triumphs by big brands Stanbic Bank who clinched four of 10 awards they were nominated for. Their victories included the “Wumula Ka Stress” campaign for Design, “Kikole for Less” campaign for Integrated, “All for Love” for the Internal Campaign category, and another win for “Wumula Ka Stress” under the Effective Creativity category.
Metro are also the agency that works withTotalEnergies EP Uganda, who were nominated in four categories, and secured two wins—one for the “Action for Sustainability” campaign and another for the “Road Safety” campaign. TotalEnergies were crowned Brand of the Year, a testament to their commitment to working collaboratively with host communities towards achieving Uganda’s first oil by 2025.
At the same awards Metro’s Andrew Mulumba won the Art Director of the Year award.
Speaking at the UMEAS on Friday evening, Josephine Muvumba, Managing Director at MetropolitanRepublic Uganda, credited the dedicated team for their hard work, emphasizing their commitment to elevating the quality of their work and meeting clients’ expectations.
According to Yosia Lukwago, the Business Development Director and Head of Client Service at MetropolitanRepublic; “This has been a challenging year in terms of New Business. Companies that usually have budgets to spend on Marketing services were still reeling from the effects of a 2-year go slow from the-all dreaded Covid period. The silver lining, we have seen is that it is clear to most businesses in the market that spending (in Marketing) is now critical, to remind the customer of the need for their specific products / services in the coming year, 2024.
Source: PML Daily