Retroviral crowned Africa's PR Agency of the Year at the 2023 EMEA Sabre Awards

Source: Provoke Media Provoke Media The Retroviral agency team. The agency was named African agency of the year last night's 2023 EMEA Sabre Awards

In February both campaigns won innovation Sabres. Last night Lil-Lets won in the Practice Areas category, under Marketing Communications, and Checkers Sixty60 in the category Industry Sectors, Consumer Goods, Retailers.

Retroviral takes the double at the EMEA Innovation Sabres

22 Feb 2023

Two other South African PR consultancies also won on the night.

In the Diamond Sabre Awards Razor - M&C Saatchi Group was awarded the Sabre Award for Superior Achievement in Reputation Management for its 500 Tonnes Light campaign for Anglo American, while Shoprite with KAMuses won for its campaign The power of a storyline to highlight existing products in the Africa category.

See all the category winners here

A zig to the agency’s world zag

Mike Sharman, founder of Retroviral expressed his joy at the wins, saying he was very "chuffed and insanely proud".

"Last night’s successes at the Sabre Awards really emphasise the work we are doing and how we are punching above our weight as a small agency on the tip of southern Africa, competing with the best of the best on a global scale, especially as we consider ourselves as a challenger agency for challenger brands," he says.

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Since the agency started just over 13 years it has been doing things differently, which really came to the fore in 2020 with its My Kreepy Teacher campaign.

“Since then we have been doing it our way, telling branded content and developing our stories in a way that is a zig to the agency’s world zag," he explains.

The result is campaigns such as the Checkers Sixty60 Sixty60 Swindler and the Lil-Lets BeYou. Period.

“The Lil-Lets work cuts through menstrual taboos and the platform we built for Lil-Lets helps regular South African women every day to have a conversation about the fears, the scary and taboo topics all around menstruation, something that is very close to the entire agency’s heart," says Sharman.

He adds: "The effort, craft, insights, understanding, and nuances from those various customer segment levels are not only resulting in impactful bottom lines for our brands but also metal winning success for our agency."

2023 EMEA Consultancies of the year

All the winners are marked in bold.

See the list here