For the second year running Air New Zealand scooped the Grand Prix Award at the NZ Direct Marketing Awards, held last night at the Cordis Auckland. The latest winning work – crafted by Air NZ agency partner Track – was for Air New Zealand’s Airpoints campaign. 

The Herald On Sunday, the ODT and the Dominion Post are among the newspapers to post gains in the 2017 Nielsen national readership survey – out overnight. The rising magazines include Mindfood, Metro, Australian Women’s Weekly, Taste, OhBaby!, Houses, NZ Geographic, and Simply You.

A leading global technology infrastructure of on-demand-audio, Acast, has expanded to New Zealand establishing a partnership with local digital marketing agency Digital Commons to provide brands and advertisers with the ability to reach new engaged audiences via podcasts.

WARNING: There will be no late sales when the 2018 Axis Awards deadline closes at 4pm today (Friday 2 March). “Tickets are limited this year as we are in a different venue,” The Comms Council’s Natasha Galloway said.

Transtasman production company Goodoil has opened an office in Auckland – and kicked off the business by signing the key Auckland management team at Robber’s Dog, which has now closed.

Special Group has launched its latest round of Smirnoff billboards showing the ingredients and potentional occasions. The New Zealand-originated Pure Potential campaign, now in its fifth year, has helped lift sales volume by 28% and value by 71%.

DDB Group’s television work for Lotto New Zealand has been selected as Best Ad of the Week by global creative site Bestadsontv (part of Australia’s Campaign Brief empire).

Saatchi & Saatchi New Zealand has beaten off three Australian agencies to win the final pitch as Tourism Fiji’s global brand agency of record, following a selection process and creative pitch that began in mid-2017.

Increased advertising revenue and lower operational expenses lifted TVNZ’s earnings performance for the six months ended December – with the company reporting EBITDAF of $30.2 million, up $4.5 million (17.4%) on the same period last year.

Auckland’s Special Group has been crowned New Zealand Agency of the Year by Australia-based Campaign Brief.