FMBE Awards – A Who’s Who history in pictures – 1st 21 years

CPM stands in a special class for long standing client relationships as shown here, winning with Asda in 2004 and in 2024. Jonny Lamb, MD, Promologistics is seen presenting their 2024 award for Operational Success. Promologistics is just the most approachable logistics resource for FMBE agencies and brands and also has a long FMBE history.

RPM winning in 2004 with current MD Dom Robertson centre. The presenter – right – was Food and Drink authority Joe Wadsack. I shared this with the text from the magazine because it show that even back in 2004 RPM’s reputation was for long term brand strategy – and from the word go FMBE looked for this quality. RPM’s core relations include Diageo and Sky and both have shorlisted through the years since. We even named Sky for special Experiential Brand recognition about 10 years ago when the brand – supported by RPM with Skyride – had taken centre stage of the cycling revolution in Britain.

2011 – Ignite – now Wasserman – in dominant form with Vodafone. This brand and agency pairing stole an industry march by making talent, sports and music come together to devastating effect. These days Casey Wasserman is set to lead the LA Olympics in 2 year’s time and although this was Ignite not Wasserman back then you could see the connections.
One famous campaign from back then saw Vodafone activate their McLaren F1 sponsorship by having members of the public bring the parts of a new F1 car into central Berlin where mechanics, including a disguised Lewis Hamilton assembled the new seasn’s F1 car. It won Platinum at FMBE.
Vodafone was also in the vanguard of brands working seamlessly with music – making steaming and recharging part of their event experiences.

Midshare and Lynx’s Fallen Angels – a ground breaking augmented reality campaign from 2011 that won FMBE Silver. It was one of the first times tech really blew our minds. In some ways it would have been nice for FMBE to see this campaign win gold, but in truth the coverage it drove was not accounted for with enough vigour and the category it was in demanded evaluation (which the entry paper didn’t robustly provide). These days we have a tech category for which it might have been better suited.

These two pictures from PrettyGreen’s multiple years of work with Cadbury in the lead up to and during the 2012 London Olympics.
As a agency this work saw PrettyGreen announced as a PR conversation starting agency that could also do all the staff and logistics organising for the ground-breaking Spots vs Stripes campaign – that tapped into the psyche of competitive British families. It felt like britsh egg and spoon style staples connected us directly with our athletic heroes.
Cadbury has a special place in the history of FMBE – through judging we have a strong connection with the massive and lasting Easter Egg trails in FM and we have celebrated my brilliant Creme Egg campaigns. Not only that but in FM, post Kraft (Mondelez) acquisition we have come to know so many of the Easter and Christmas campaigns in store – with REL Field Marketing/ Smollan.
As one further aside, at this year’s awards one of the people in that Cadbury team pic spotted themselves!

2013 – iD promoting East Village in Stratford to win FMBE Gold. We saw this as a breakthrough campaign as it showed how experiential techniques created a real sense of the desireability of this development.

2013 – Still the strongest ever entry in our sponsorship activation category – DRPG and Sainsbury’s actvation of the supermarket’s Paralympic Games sponsorship that saw Sainsbury’s carers recognised as torch bearers, a huge B2E success, store sales success and an inclusive Active Kids legacy.
The entry was brilliant, meaningful, relevant and heartfelt.
It certainly helped that the activation was led top down from prominent CEO Justin King who was on the Board for the games and the Mayor of London’s close advisor.
Justin King was a huge advocate of FMBE – at around the time of this entry he supported one of Cosine’s in store sampling team to Brand Ambassador of the Year success with a video tesimonial.

2013 and 2014 – Two campaigns for TRO and Lucozade. The first was a step up in Festival takeovers and a very good campaign but that didn’t prepare us for 2014’s Conditions Zone – one of the very best immersive events, that saw a hot box facility land in London and mimic the hot and humid conditions of the World Cup in Brazil – with 5 asides led by stars including Alan Shearer.

2014 – More football action as The Circle Agency and PlayStation brought us the brand story behind the School’s Cup. The National Finals took place at Reading’s Madejski Stadium.

2014 – Not all successful campaigns have carried on. This activity, a store display sell in for Tuborg in Russia proved how translatable Cosine’s skills could be, at a rather more peaceful time in International relations.

2012 – 2014: REL Field Marketing stole a march on other FM agencies by delivering a previously unprecedented accountability for team ethic. Healthy competition between their strategic brand teams helped lead to the incremental gains. The agency also found new levels of client engagement with the awards. FM clients had previuously been a part of the event through judging and entry sign off, but this changed through these years to a greater level of shared award entry input. REL’s team entries frequently saw in houise and outsourced teams promoting leaders from one to the other.

2014 – Wins with Warwick Davis hosting – for Cosine and Logobrand. The Cosine win with Danone Nutricia was one of the most extraordinary we have seen as Cosine used field data to help the baby-food brand to overcome global supply issues.
Logobrand took the tactical category with William Grant in a trademark data-driven win. A year later they would win Agency of the Year for the first time.

2015 – Highjam with The Guardian. In the 21 years of FMBE print, as an industry, has been in steady decline. Through that time the super agency-client relationship between Highjam and Guardian Media has helped to minimise that decline for the daily newspaper.
In 2025, when The Observer was sold to Tortoise, Highjam was the automatic go to to help with an ambitious relaunch day at the London Marathon.

Hope&Glory justly wins a stack of PR agency awards and accolades but seen as a brand experience agency there’s no regular at FMBE that sees such bold ideas delivered in a live environmemt. This human tatoo gallery for Tru TV was a striking gold winning example.

2015 – Wasserman delivering shopping centre success for Sky. I like this picture because there’s so much engagement going on.

2015 – Wasserman with Spotify in Nike stores. Whilst we knew this was good, we didn’t think much about this when we first saw it, but small footprint retail experiences with more than one brand invested were not the norm then and they are now. And this one really worked for all stakeholders.

2015 – Kru Live with Keds, a globally co-ordinated staffing activity. At the second FMBEs in 2006 I was asked a favour as new start up Kru asked permission to advertise on trikes outside the venue. I was very impressed with the openness and drive of the agency who wanted to establish a highly principled staff recruitment and payment process.
They soon proved successful and have been in the top echelon of staff providers every since.
I remember this win feeling very special for the team and this photo captures that.

I love this photo for the unbridled joy it shows with presenter Russell Kane and the REL Field Marketing (now Smollan) Mondelez crew. Jamie Fletcher, holding the trophy, is one of the most passionate guests that we host at FMBE.

2016 – Dame Christopher Biggins presents Gold to Gekko and Karcher along with Nigel Cruttenden (right), Movista, one of FMBE’s ever presents and one of the first to send round congratulations to finalists and winners. Gekko remains the only consumer electronics specialist to win Agency of the Year (2008) a year when they reinvented store retail in the UK with Store-In-Store with Apple.

2016 – Dame Biggins and the Warburtons’ muppets. The in-house Warburton’s campaign launch for Giant Crumpets remains a benchmark case study. The baker showed us how to execute a product launch in store without cannibalising its existing success in crumpets and other Warburton’s campaigns.
Warburton’s came into the FMBE Awards after the leader in the field, Mark Jones enjoyed judging. Mark is still a guest at FMBE Awards now as he became MD at admired FM agency Logobrand.

2016 – iD with Cornetto at the cinema with a screening of the film Two Sides – a cinema with a secret second side. Hidden event areas are relatively commonplace now, but we look back on this entry as the first one that delivered a hidden chambre that truly enhanced the experience.

2016 – Wasserman with Bombay Sapphire on a train staffed by theatrical performers from Coalition.
We has seen immersive theatre before but the acting, ambition and journey itinerary for this camapign ratcheted it all up a level.
Coalition’s actor-staff have often supported FMBE, not least in 2021 when we produced the event 2 weeks after a lockdown Christmas and New Year – at Oxford Town Hall. No one else could have given us such performer presenters at such short notice.

2017 – Our Red Dwarf inspired set at Troxy had sliding doors to reveal Craig Charles.

2017 – Craig Charles on stage with Hope&Glory

2017 – One of Hope&Glory’s winning campaigns – an emotional message laden interactive Christmas Tree for Marie Curie.

2018 – N2O take the stage to win in Shopping Centre and Roadshow with Tesco. Presenting the award at a Top of the Pops themed Troxy was Pat Sharp and SpaceandPeople’s Andrew Bodwick (right).
Since 2018 Tesco has really motored forwards and an experiential brand, in a positive cycle of success. In the same period N2O has won BE Agency of the Year three times.

2018 – Jackanory’s Immersive event category winner for Hamburg Convention Centre at London’s Truman Brewery. It was an incredible eclectic event that was all about real life, real people.

2018 – PRL In Market Solutions furthering their reputation in Product Launch with Lucozade.

2019 – It was a case of work hard and play hard at Field Sales Solutions as the very energised agency took the FM Agency of the Year plaudits with account success and employee wellbeing pairing very well together.

2019 – Blue Square with an B2E incentive travel piece that pushed our category criteria into new realms. We had never had an incentive travel entry that was both a staff reward and such a coherent brand engagement campaign as this work with Samsung.

2020 – An immersive event winner for 2Heads and Airbus. 2020 was of course an odd year with some 2019 events able to enter before lockdown. This one might have won any year.
2020 was the year I presented FMBE Awards from my house, live on camera all day. I had heard other awards has released their results via text message and was shocked as we knew if ever there was a captive audience, COVID lockdown provided it
We set up a studio, soundproofed by Weetabix and decorated with L’Oreal pop up displays and more, sent in to us by the FMBE industry. The fridge and the cupboards were filled with consumer products, Costa, Red Bull, Fruit Shoots, Heineken, Heinz and Cadbury…
We took the time to go long form with interviews with the shortlisted finalsists online all day and filmed reveals of the winners using skits of family members, our dog and cat. We were rewarded with a global audience of 150,000.
We spent the day with that huge audience championing the opportunities that brands still had to reach people using authentic events – online, hybrid and more – and left them with evidence that they should be thirsting to be first back with experiences post COVID.
For the Airbus winner above’s clip we revealed a mini Airbus using a linen napkin unfurling in slomo.

2020 – One of the most important winners of 2020, TRO with BMW E-Racing and a drive-in race screening in Berlin. Events like this kept some top talent in the events industry, and paid some mounting bills. Imaginative, brave, logistically smart and very TRO.

2021 A stylish hybrid event for transmission business Belden by 2Heads. This work led two a series of global builds for the brand.
I liked this entry as it showed off work for a very powerful and exacting business and brand that extends the reach of FMBE, whilst the hybrid format had a real purpose for this global enterprise.

2021 – The Circle Agency in action with Costa. The Covid years saw this relationship flourish in a great of example of when the going gets tough, the tough get going.

2021 – PrettyGreen with LEGO at Christmas 2020. Why did LEGO not just pull the plug on a Christmas COVID immersive event? Because the trusted PrettyGreen to make every moment count and they knew that there was a genuine thirst for a bold happy event that only a highly experiential brand could pull off.

2022 – Fizz Experience with Costco, at our Hat’s Off event at Ascot with Simon Evans presenting.

2022 – Green Field Marketing winning Professional Agency Management after agency success following their management buyout. Also winining the New Agency Award that year, Green Field Marketing’s succeses at FMBE since have shown the agency to be on a positive cycle.

2022 – Taking the Hat’s Off theme very seriously at Ascot Racecourse, Field Sales Solutions and P&G won Campaign of the Year for the launch of Lenor Outdoorable.
Standing second right, next to comedian Simon Evans is one of FMBE’s ever presents – Andrew Elsey, P&G, who has frequently participated as an FMBE judge.
Back in 2004, when I started FMBE Awards I had a few people who I consulted with to make sure that I got the awards categories right. Andrew’s then boss Nick Stevens was onesuch and he brought Andrew in on the discussion.
The discussion meant that we started FMBE Awards with the approval of the biggest brand manufacturer for British shoppers and the brand owner that is often Britain’s biggest advertiser on board.
As a business I have found P&G to be completely magnanimous about FMBE Awards, celebrating their own, their friends and their rivals wins and often posting kind comments about the event, its ethos and the best practices we drive forwards.

2022 – We Are Collider with Arcane. This global entertainment sector campaign was an easy winner and it indicated the start of a new wave of brand experiences featuring in multiple countries – a new level of confidence in UK talent – something that had taken a backseat after Brexit and COVID.

2023 – Craig MacFarlane, account director, the Circle Agency. Its just a great photo. As we celebrated ‘Bold by Design’ at Ascot, encouraging our guests to wear a spash of colour, Craig managed to epitomise the event theme perfectly in this celebratory pose by our themed event wall built for us by Arcstream with moments like these in mind,
The celebration in this case was silver in the Special Award .

The silver celebration in the picture before this was kept off gold by this Fizz Experience and Costco team. Costco and Fizz is one of the longest standing relationships in FMBE and often seamless. In 2017, as part of their ‘evolution’ Costco used Fizz’s expert sampling team to make it’s foray into store launch in Iceland a success.

2023 – Gold in Roadshow/Shopping Centre was highly-significant for Blue Square contributing towards Bronze in BE Agency of the Year for a team that before COVID we had bracketed exclusively in the FM world.
They remain the only agency to be shortlisted for both FM and BE Agency of the Year and can lay claim to being FMBE’s most vesatile.
When we first started out doing FMBE Awards, Brand Experience specialists were still nascent. But they soon took off, leaving the old sampling teams from FM agencies looking a little flat-footed.
Now FM to BE and BE to FM crossover is becoming more commonplace again with BE agencies pushing for success in our Retail Experience category and FM agencies increasingly featuring in immersive events and roadshows.
We don’t know where that is headed but it does add value to the talent pool that FMBE Awards represents with both types of agency recruiting talent from each other.
This Roadshow also won the £25,000 space prize at Network Rail, delivered via SpaceandPeople and we came very close to the winning team defending in 2024 with the Samsung AI bus that used Kings Cross for one of its many destinations. That one won silver.

2023 – Weetabix win Team. The brand has a core strategic relationship with REL Field Marketing (now Smollan). The relationship has led Weetabix to being the most successful brand in the FM Award categories and the Brand Ambassador category. The team established and consolidated Weetabix’s position as the highest selling cereal in the UK, overhauling Kellogg’s Corn Flakes in 2012.

2023 – A donut giveaway that sold student accommodation by TRO for Unite Students was just exceptional in every way – including ROI – leading to Campaign of thr Year and contributing to Agency of the Year for TRO. TRO also won that year for creating the first Anthropy event at The Eden Project, a massively ambitous and revolutionary event that coined the term Anthropists for its planet-positive delegates.

2024 – Elevate Global at the Paris Olympics. What a win.

2024 – N2O – what it feels like to win BE Agency of the Year. N2O’s Founder and CEO, Clare James and Terrence Woodward are the two people seated in the middle.

2024 ABM Experience Solutions – then Blackjack Promotions – delivering in store for Avolta. This team helped define retail experience with the FMBE Award winning ‘Contentainment’ (2014)

2024 – CPM Ireland wining Campaign of the Year for their Instore Six Nations activations for Guinness.

2024 – LINK Communication winning the retail experience category for sampling the chewy drink Mogu Mogu. LINK is now the established dominant force in this category.

2024 – The Shopping Centre/Roadshow category winner for N2O and P&O Cruises picked up the £25,000 space prize at Network Rail. The prize is delivered along wide lead sponsor SpaceandPeople.

2024 – Team of the Year – HariMoCo and Powerforce – with Nigel Cruttenden (left) presenting on behalf of sponsor Movista. HariMoCo is an amalgam name given to the sales team that jointly represents Haribo and Molson Coors. It is an innovative team that spreads the costs for both brands whilst understanding the passion points and retail requirements of both.
It was an outstanding year for Powerforce who also picked up Agency of the Year.

2024 – An e-sports team take a bow in the incredible Red Bull League of its Own. Red Bull is such an experience driven brand and has enjoyed success in FMBE across multiple categories through the year’s. Back in 2005, then MD Nigel Trood declared Red Bull a forever supporter of FMBE after he saw the direct motivational effects of our awards on his sales team. Red Bull famously won 3 Team of the Year awards in the mid 2000s.
This e-sports event was in Berlin, one of many events created for the brand by agency We Are Collider and proved an easy gold winner in the Digital/Tech category.