18 agencies and companies were awarded during the 17th edition of Effie’s Gala that took place for the first time in an online format, live-streamed on the Facebook pages of Effie Romania & IAA Romania and live on Discord.
This year, a total of 1 Grand Effie, 8 Gold, 13 Silver and 19 Bronze Effie trophies were awarded.
The winning agencies and companies this year are Cohn & Jansen WT, HEADVERTISING, Kubis Interactive, GMP+WEBSTYLER, LEO BURNETT, Graffiti PR, Mainstage The Agency, Mercury360, Minio Studio, Most Wanted Ideas, MRM // McCann Romania, Propaganda, Publicis Romania, Saatchi & Saatchi + The Geeks, The Onion Media, Tribal Worldwide, VODAFONE ROMANIA and Zenith.
The top 3 agencies that got the highest score in the competition are Leo Burnett Romania, Publicis and MSL The Practice.

Leo Burnett Romania won 15 awards – 1 Grand Effie, 4 Gold Effies, 5 Silver and 5 Bronze Effies – for the following projects: Samsung – The Banknote Concerts (Grand Effie, 1 Gold Effie in Branded Utility category and 3 Silver Effies in Seasonal Marketing, Brand Experience and Carpe Diem categories), Telekom – Storytime (Gold Effie in Brand Experience and Silver Effie in Branded Utility), Telekom – Smart Wi-Fi (Gold Effie in Telecommunications category), Curtea Veche Publishing – #TimeToRead (Gold Effie in Other products & services, 2 Bronze Effies in Engaged Communities and Positive Change: Social Good – Brands), Gillette Skinguard – „Life without Irritations” (Silver Effie in Branded Content & Entertainment category and Bronze Effie in Personal Care Products & Services, together with Graffiti PR), Telekom – THE BURNOUT HOTLINE (2 Bronze Effies in Branded Utility and Positive Change: Social Good – Brands categories).

Publicis Romania won a total of 8 trophies – 1 Gold Effie, 3 Silver Effie and 4 Bronze Effie – for Timișoreana – The unconditional supporter of football (Gold Effie in Sports Marketing category), Drama Queen – Magnevie Stress Resist (1 Silver Effie in Brand Experience), OLX – NO TWO JOBS ARE THE SAME and GET THE WHOLE STORY ON AUTOVIT.RO, each won 1 Silver Effie in the E-Commerce category, Carrefour – Proofs of Love (1 Bronze Effie in Retail), ORANGE LOVE + HBO (Bronze Effie in Telecommunications), Coca-Cola – The gift of listening (Bronze Effie in Seasonal Marketing category) and Kinder – SANTA’S CALLING (Bronze Effie in Brand Experience).
The most efficient clients of this year’s edition are: Telekom and Samsung tied for first place. Besides the Grand Effie, Samsung has won 1 Gold and 3 Silver Effie trophies for The Banknote Concert campaign. And Telekom got 2 Gold Effies, 1 Silver and 2 Bronze trophies. Ursus Breweries is the third client, with a Gold Effie won for Timișoreana and other 5 Nominations for URSUS.

Top 3 winning brands in this competition: Telekom and SAMSUNG tied, and in the third place is Curtea Veche Publishing.
The brands with winning campaigns in the 2020 edition of Romanian Effie Awards are 5 to go, Aqua Carpatica Autovit.ro, BCR, Carrefour, Coca-Cola, Curtea Veche Publishing, Durex, Edenia Foods, Funky Citizens, George, Gillette, ING Bank, KFC, Kinder, Magnevie Stress Resist, Mountain Dew, Napolact, OLX Jobs, ORANGE, ROMANIAN POLICE, Rompetrol GO, SAMSUNG, Telekom, Timișoreana, TUC, Unisol and Vodafone.
According to Romanian Effie Rankings, created based on the international Effie Index system, the Client of the Year title is won by Telekom & Samsung, Brand of the Year is once again a tie between Telekom and Samsung. Agency of the Year is Leo Burnett Romania.
The 2020 Effie edition’s Grand Effie was won by The Banknote Concert campaign (Samsung & Leo Burnett).

Effie 2020 Awarding Gala took place online and was hosted by Andi Moisescu. Along with the award ceremony, Effie wanted to highlight this past year’s industry stories by hosting a series of live talks.
At the center of these talks were 8 special guests with a background in advertising, marketing and related fields: Mihai Bârsan, President of the Organizing Committee EFFIE 2020, Victor Dobre, Executive Director IAA Romania, Dana Pascu, Brand Strategy Consultant, Răzvan Căpănescu, Creative Partner Wings CLL, Hypno, Imagemaker, Raul Gheba, Comedian, writer & copywriter, Bogdan Naumovici, Managing Partner 23 Communication Ideas and last but not least, Șerban Pavlu, actor.
They tackled 4 major conversation themes: (I) CHALLENGE, CONTEXT & OBJECTIVES, (II) INSIGHT & STRATEGIC IDEA, (III) BRINGING THE IDEA TO LIFE & (IV) RESULTS. These are actual sections of the entry form each participant submitted in the festival and Effie 2020 wanted to take the chance and address them openly from its guests’ points of view.
This year’s Effie jury president was Charlie Hiscocks, Founder of Curious Eye Ltd. Charlie also led the Effie 2020 Scoring Committee, a structure formed this year to establish the nominees and the winners of the competition.
The Effie 2020 Organizing Committee included the following members: Mihai Bârsan, President Romanian Effie Awards Committee 2020 & Business Leader, Entrepreneur, Alexandra Dimitriu, Chief Media Officer, Publicis Groupe România, Bogdan Țurcanu, Commercial Manager, Ursus Breweries, Costin Radu, Independent Strategy Consultant, Dan Petre, Business Developer, D&D Research, Mihai Trandafir, Managing Director, UM România, Ruxandra Rău, Director Brand & Communication Strategy, Telekom România, Silvia Mihăilescu, Director of Brand, Marketing & Communications, ING România and Victor Stroe, Head of Strategy & Associate Director, Leo Burnett.
The detailed list of Romanian Effie Awards 2020 can be consulted here.

Romanian Effie Awards 2020 is an event by IAA România and UAPR, supported by Kaufland, Philip Morris România, Coca-Cola, George and Ursus Specialități.
Strategic partners: Deloitte and Nielsen
Creative Partner: Jazz Communication
Traditional Partner: The Institute
Live Streaming Partner: Nexus
Media Partners: PRO TV, BIZ, IQads, Smark și Pagina de Media