2012 EthicMark® Award nominations now open!

kristySRI/ESG News

2012 EthicMark® Award nominations now open!

Dear EthicMark® Judges Panel Members:

As Co-Chairs of the EthicMark® Award Judges Panel, formerly known as the EthicMark® Award Advisory Board, we first want to thank you again for your dedication and service as a member of the Panel.

We are honored to have such an illustrious Panel. We have extended through the end of 2012 the terms of those Panel members whose terms were set to expire at the end of 2011.

We added several new Panel members during 2011, who were all appointed to a two-year term. Their terms will be renewed for another two years each time they vote on the slate of nominations we send out to Panel members.

We look forward to continuing to work with you to foster a transformative shift in the advertising field by demonstrating the power of media campaigns to simultaneously further the public interest and legitimate private interests.

Nominations open February 15 to April 30:

From February 15 to April 30, we are accepting online nominations for the 2012 EthicMark® Award for media communications that uplift the human spirit and society. Please submit your nominations on the EthicMark® section of the University of Notre Dame Mendoza College of Business, Department of Marketing website. We value your expertise and we need your participation to make the 2012 Award a success.

After we assemble the list of qualifying nominations, we will ask you to vote on the winners. We will send you instructions about how to log in to the Notre Dame website and complete the voting process.

Two categories of nominations, for-profit and not-for-profit:

We will again have two categories of nominations and winners—a for-profit and a not-for-profit category.

The for-profit category will consist of a company’s advertising designed to promote its commercial brand or to market its products or services.

The not-for-profit category will consist of ads designed to promote an idea or social cause, as well as public service announcements intended to educate the public about significant social issues in an effort to change the public’s attitudes and behaviors and stimulate positive social change.

In determining the proper category, it is irrelevant whether the advertising agency that produces the ad makes a profit. Of course, all ads in either category will be judged according to the Award criteria.

Please solicit nominations from your network:

We hope you will share news about the Award with your networks so we can expand the number of outstanding nominations, especially from media markets outside the U.S.

Nominating ads in a language other than English:

People can nominate ads in a language other than English by submitting either the ad dubbed in English or a written English translation of the ad. Organizations or companies that learn one of their ads may be nominated for the Award will be happy to provide a dubbed copy or translation.

Past winners and history of the Award:

Past winners of the EthicMark® Award show the caliber of ads we are looking for. In 2011, Liberty Mutual won in the for-profit category for an ad, Responsibility: Doing the Right Thing, which fosters discussion about what it means to do the right thing. Nike Foundation won in the not-for-profit category for The Girl Effect: The Clock is Ticking, which shows that “investment in girls in developing countries can unleash the world’s greatest untapped solution to poverty.”

The 2008 Award went to the Unlikely Alliances campaign created by the Alliance for Climate Protection (founded by Vice President Al Gore) and the Martin Agency.

In 2009, Pantene, a division of Proctor & Gamble, won in the for-profit category for its ad, Chrysalis (Thailand).

CARE won in the not-for-profit category for its ad, I Am Powerful (USA), about a natural resource that is greatly overlooked and could hold the key to improving our planet.

The 2010 winner was The Story of Bottled Water, created by the Story of Stuff Project and Free Range Studios.

You can read the full history of the Award, including information about other past winners and Honorable Mentions, on the World Business Academy’s website.

2012 Award presentation at 23rd annual SRI Conference, Oct. 2-4:

We will present the 2012 Awards at the 23rd annual SRI Conference on Sustainable, Responsible, Impact Investing, which will be held October 2-4, 2012 at the Mohegan Sun Conference Center in southeastern Connecticut. The SRI Conference is the premier annual gathering of investors and investment professionals working to direct the flow of investment capital in more positive, healthy, and transformative ways. Four members of the EthicMark® Judges Panel were plenary speakers at SRI’s November 2010 conference, where we presented the 2010 EthicMark® Award.

Honoring and celebrating ethical marketing and media campaigns is a powerful way to transform commercial marketing so that it promotes what is good for society and the planet at the same time it promotes what is good for business. Thank you for your all your help in making the Award a success and the world a better place!

Best regards,

Hazel Henderson
Founding President, Ethical Markets Media, LLC

Rinaldo Brutoco
Founding President, World Business Academy

Patrick E. Murphy
Professor of Marketing, Notre Dame Mendoza College of Business