These communications industry’s rising stars have won the jury over with their project titled “Priče koje izuvaju iz cipela”, which made them the winners of Young Lions Croatia powered by Elan. This year, the competition has once again placed young Croatian talents in the spotlight, while also shedding light on the importance of recreational running for a healthy life.
Young Lions is a competition where the national communications industry’s new generation battles for the title of the best young creatives. By winning the prestigious Grand Prix, young lions are awarded an extraordinary opportunity to represent Croatia at the global Cannes Young Lions competition and feel the vibe of the world’s biggest festival of creativity – and the winners of this year’s 24-hour competitive challenge are young lionesses Jana Cvetko and Wana Kiiru from Komunikacijski laboratorij with their Priče koje izuvaju iz cipela project!
At the Zagreb Innovation Centre (ZICER), 110 young lions – the biggest number of contestants yet – worked on their creative solutions in five competitive categories: Design, Digital, PR, Media and Print. The winners in the PR category, as well as the holders of the Grand Prix award, are Jana Cvetko and Wana Kiiru (Komunikacijski laboratorij), followed by runners-up Mate Šola and Ela Ban (McCann Zagreb). The winners in the Design category are Leopoldina Jovanovski and Mirjam Milas (Bruketa&Žinić&Grey). In the Digital category, Nika Vojvodić and Tena Kuzmanović (Publicis) took the first prize, while the second place was taken by Nikolina Biber and Ivan Lampalov (I TO NIJE SVE), and the third prize went to Helena Marinović and Lena Šuša (Imago Ogilvy). There were no winners in the Print and Media categories.
The finalists of this year’s competition in the PR category are Lorena Čempuh and Ante Buntić (Val grupa). The finalist title in the Design category went to Nikola Heged and Tana Jeić (Šesnić&Turković), while the same accolade in the Print category was given to Maša Jakšić and Dalibor Kušenić (McCann Zagreb). Two teams in the Digital category deserved the finalist title: Lucija Franić and Inga Đuđik (BBDO Zagreb) as well as Kristina Livaja (01 Content & Technology) and Hana Matić (independent). Finalists of the Media category are Ana Koncul and Lucija Čujić (dentsu Croatia).
The Young Lions Awards Show, where the winners will receive their well-deserved trophies, will take place in the Main Hall of DK2023 on 21 April at 9 PM. If you’re interested to hear what was going through young lions’ creative minds while creating their winning work, join them at Into the Lion’s Den: Presenting Young Lions Croatia 2023 powered by Elan Winners & Finalists, which will take place on the second day of the festival in the VIP Lounge.
“It is encouraging that 55 teams, a record-breaking number, entered this year’s competition, especially when we consider the fact that the communications industry is always searching for talented young professionals. We are extremely satisfied with the winning projects, while a good number of entries show great potential – which is why we are looking forward to seeing them grow and succeed in the future”, said Vanja Bertalan (Human), president of this year’s jury, and added: “If you’re not among the winners or finalists, a huge accomplishment was even showing up and working on your idea for 24 hours from the ground up. In these 24 hours you’ve improved the skills that you might not be even aware of. Congratulations!”
It is important to highlight the competition’s humanitarian nature – every year, the young lions are working on a brief provided by a non-profit charitable organisation or a civil society organisation. Once the competition has ended, the client gets to keep the creative solutions drafted by the competing teams. This year’s partner of the competition Elan and the organiser have tasked the contestants with drafting a solution for Društvo športske rekreacije Aktivan život (DŠR) and their Trčaona project, which started a trend of learning about the benefits of running and made DŠR a pioneer in promoting recreational running for adults.
Melanja Korošec (Global Brand Director, Elan), member of this year’s Young Lions jury, stated: “I am impressed with the amount of work and level of creativity that young professionals displayed in only 24 hours. This competition requires not only creativity but tangible results in a fixed timeline, which reflects the real work environment. The winning projects give us hope for a bright future of the creative industry in the region. Congrats!”
Tea Gvardijan (Head of Communications, DŠR Aktivan život) also congratulated the young lions: “On behalf of Društvo športske rekreacije Aktivan život and Trčaona I can say that I am inspired by the number of great projects that we got to assess this year, which was truly not an easy thing to do. We congratulate all the young lions on participating, while we wish great luck to the winners in Cannes. We will try to implement their winning work, maybe even several of them, in our 2024 campaign and continue our collaboration with these amazing young people.”
Besides the president of the jury Vanja Bertalan (Human), the representative of Elan Melanja Korošec and the representative of the client Tea Gvardijan, for the selection of the very best projects in this year’s competition the credit is also due to Ana Burazer (McCann Zagreb), Ružica Ilak (Pragma komunikacije), Melanja Korošec (Elan), Sanja Petek Mujačić (Hauska & Partner), Maja Šplajt (Real grupa), Vjeko Srednoselec (Dentsu), Siniša Waldinger (Bruketa&Žinić&Grey) and Ivana Žulj (Omnicom Media Group).
The competition was also supported by Shutterstock, which granted the competitors access to their imagebank. After the unforgettable experience of competing among the Croatian teams and the upcoming experience at the global Cannes Young Lions competition, our young lionesses will also get to travel to Cannes and attend the global festival of creativity!
If you wish to join DK2023 for a celebration of young lions’ hard work, grab your festival tickets and enjoy the explosion of young creativity.