2016 Winners & Shortlists

The Campaign

The year started with a drop in weekly ticket sales for Loto Libanais. People would play more, if we could make them feel luckier. In Lebanon, people believe black cats bring bad luck. So, Loto launched a PR focused campaign to fly them out of the country. Starting with nationwide Press, Outdoor and Radio, the campaign followed with a video showing the black cats flying out of Lebanon to New Zealand, where they're actually considered to bring good luck. After we had a winner, we revealed one tiny detail: The black cats never left Lebanon. In the video, we see how Loto collected the cats and flew them to a 5-Star Hotel & Resort in New Zealand, where they had the time of their lives getting pampered by top chefs and masseuses.

The response was immediate. In a population of 4 million people, our video had over 1.5 million views on its first week, making over 56 million impressions from social media and PR alone; becoming the most shared video on Facebook on the day of its launch and the most trending topic in Lebanon. Loto had a 21% sales increase by convincing an entire nation that they could win.