Self promotion

The eleventh annual "Advertising Agency of the Year" award, organized by weekly trade magazine Media and Marketing Polska (M&MP), was given to the Polish branch of international ad agency Scholz & Friends (S&F). The agency has been operating in the Polish market for 12 years and already has an impressive portfolio for clients such as Tchibo, Netia, Grupa Żywiec and Mercedes.

S&F also ran the high-profile Euro 2012 candidacy campaign, whose success put the firm in the spotlight. "We are happy we managed to attract the public's attention, in spite of this being our first campaign of this kind," says Piotr Batogowski, president of S&F.

He believes that S&F, which currently employs 60 people, has the potential to become an institution in the industry, just like its parent agency in Germany. In 2006, the firm's sales amounted to zł.5.5 million, up 83.9 percent year-on-year, and it added another big client to its portfolio - PKO Bank Polski. In the future, aside from acquiring more high-profile customers, S&F would like to participate in the Cannes Lions festival, considered the world's most prestigious advertising festival.

"We've been busy working on our portfolio, but now we can be more active in other areas," Batogowski says. In addition to this year's M&MP award, the Polish branch of S&F also won the "Golden Heel" and "Golden Bra" awards at the Magdalena advertising festival last year in Slovenia.

S&F is the sixth branch of a foreign advertising agency to be voted "Advertising Agency of the Year" by M&MP's journalists. "The good news is that there are more and more local agencies which are already successfully competing with the foreign agencies and winning big contracts," Batogowski concludes.