The CLIO Awards, one of the world’s most recognized international advertising and design competitions honoring creative excellence and innovation in the industry, will present Dan Wieden, Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Wieden+Kennedy (W+K), with the Lifetime Achievement Award on May 13 during the 50th Anniversary CLIO Awards in Las Vegas, May 12–14. The CLIO Lifetime Achievement Award, one of the highest, most prestigious honors in the industry, recognizes the outstanding and ongoing contribution of an individual who leads the industry forward.
“CLIO is honored to present Dan Wieden with the Lifetime Achievement Award. He truly embodies the essence of a strong, committed leader, one who has made significant fundamental and progressive contributions for his clients and the industry,” said Wayne Youkhana, director of the CLIO Awards. “Dan’s contributions and pioneering spirit have certainly made a lasting impact on those who not only have had the pleasure to work with him, but the ad industry as a whole.”
In 1982, Wieden worked at a local ad agency in Portland, Oregon, with his partner David Kennedy on Nike, an upstart sneaker account (at the time). Shortly thereafter, the agency-client relationship began to falter, and Wieden+Kennedy recognized the timely opportunity to open their own agency. Wieden+Kennedy (W+K) was founded in Portland with one shared pay phone and one client – Nike. Today, the agency is a globally recognized powerhouse that has grown tremendously over the past 27 years, with nearly 1,000 employees and offices in Portland, New York City, London, Amsterdam, Delhi, Shanghai and Tokyo.
W+K prides itself on being an independent, creatively led, progressive ad agency that operates 24 hours a day, in several languages, and on projects beyond advertising including: international corporate branding; an experimental advertising school; the production of sports documentaries and television series; pro bono campaigns for clients in every office around the globe; as well as the W+K Tokyo Lab, which releases some of Japan’s best new music. W+K currently works with worldwide recognizable brands such as Nike, Levi’s, Heineken, ESPN, Coca-Cola, Electronic Arts, Honda, Procter & Gamble, Target, Disney/PIXAR and Nokia. Last year, Adweek named W+K “2007 Global Agency of the Year.”
“It is a great, great honor. And I am forever thankful. That said, I feel like a thief,” said Wieden. “This award rightfully belongs to that humming mass of brains and hearts at Wieden+Kennedy that built this network, office by office, day by day, job by job. They take my breath away.”
Wieden himself has won several honors, including: Inc. magazine’s “America’s 25 Most Intriguing Entrepreneurs”; Time magazine’s “World’s 50 Cyber Elite”; and Advertising Age’s “100 Ad People of the 20th Century.” He is also the founder of Caldera, a nonprofit arts education organization and camp for at-risk youth located in Sisters, Oregon. Wieden grew up in Portland, graduated from the University of Oregon and worked briefly in public relations before switching careers to advertising.
This year’s three-day CLIO festival will be held May 12–14, 2009 at the Hard Rock Hotel & Casino in Las Vegas. In addition to the Lifetime Achievement Awards show, the festival will feature four distinct award shows, including Moving Image Awards, Emerging Media Awards, Communications Awards and Design Awards. There will also be receptions, after-parties, a comprehensive and forward-thinking educational conference featuring the world’s greatest creative minds, a 50th Anniversary CLIO Awards viewing gallery, as well as multiple networking opportunities for CLIO delegates.
For more information about the 50th Anniversary CLIO Awards or to register online for the festival, please visit www.clioawards.com.
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About The CLIO Awards
The CLIO Awards is one of the world’s most recognized awards competitions for advertising, design and interactive. Celebrating its 50th Anniversary in 2009, the CLIO Awards has maintained its original commitment to celebrate and reward creative excellence, honoring a powerful form of communication and its impact on modern culture. At the same time, the CLIO Awards remains focused on evolving with the industry in order to acknowledge the most current, breakthrough work. To this day, CLIO’s iconic statue is the most widely recognized and coveted symbol of the industry’s creative accomplishments. The CLIO Awards are produced by Nielsen Business Media, a part of The Nielsen Company, a global information and media company.
About The Nielsen Company
The Nielsen Company is a global information and media company with leading market positions in marketing and consumer information, television and other media measurement, online intelligence, mobile measurement, trade shows and business publications (Billboard, The Hollywood Reporter, Adweek). The privately held company is active in more than 100 countries, with headquarters in New York, USA. For more information, please visit www.nielsen.com.
