Every day this week, strategy is revealing the 2020 Agency of the Year winners. Full coverage, including shortlists for each category and the winners announced so far, can be found here.

Day two of the Agency of the Year virtual winner reveal kicks off with placements in the PR category.

This year’s Gold winning public relations firm is The Colony Project, taking the first place position for the comms work it led for clients Kraft Heinz, Nando’s and Tourism Yukon.

In second place, Craft takes home a Silver medal for buzzy programs designed to build awareness for Nintendo, Mott’s Fruitsations, and The Royal Agricultural Winter Fair.

And finally, the Bronze trophy goes to Pomp & Circumstance, a PR firm that received high marks for work created for Mercedes Benz, Amica Senior Lifestyles and Peloton.

Here are the features on each of the winning agencies, which also appeared in this month’s strategy magazine:

As the world changes, so too does The Colony Project
Craft digs its toes in CPG stories
Pomp & Circumstance marches to its own drum

You can get a snapshot of each agency’s winning cases below, including the PR Campaign of the Year; for more detailed cases on winners profiles, visit the Agency of the Year site.

And make sure to check back here every day this week to see the winners in the other AOY categories: tomorrow, we’ll reveal the top shops in the Digital category. And for those who missed it, here are the winners in Design.

GOLD: The Colony Project

PR Campaign of the Year: At a time when jigsaws were trending during the pandemic, Kraft Heinz designed a slow-building puzzle to mimic its ever-so slow pour. The product expanded to 16 markets, as The Colony Project built buzz through social contests and giveaways to red sauce enthusiasts.

Toronto Raptor Pascal Siakam (a.k.a “Spicy P”) was a pro at bringing spice to the court. Fans were asking to bottle him up, so Nando’s created a limited-edition sauce after the player, while the PR agency went ballistic on media outreach, paid social and life-size POS in stores to reach new audiences for the resto.

The agency helped promote the Yukon as an epic vacation spot via an Indiegogo campaign, which raised funds so it could recreate the “Gold Rush.” It mailed panning kits to donors, dropping real Klondike gold into a creek for its visitors to fish out.

SILVER: Craft Public Relations

Nintendo wanted to spark interest among little ones, many of whom aren’t growing up with the console in their hands. Reaching kids through traditional channels just wouldn’t do, so the brand created a one-of-a-kind playhouse that immersed visitors in Nintendo-themed game rooms. All Craft had to do was drive kids to visit in droves, a task it pulled off through a contest with Corus and influencer media relations with kid-centric personalities.

To give millennial moms a reason to choose Mott’s Fruitsations for their kids, Craft arranged a media tour with Jason Priestley (a celebrity they grew up watching) speaking about the brand’s CSR partnership with the Breakfast Club of Canada.

To bring the Royal Agricultural Winter Fair’s exciting features (think, giant pumpkins and jumping pups) to media before the actual event, Craft cast the event’s first ambassador, Lil Ben. On his media tour, the tiny pony hopped on the GO train to the Royal, opened the fair with Toronto Mayor John Tory and even paid visits to 22 influencers.

BRONZE: Pomp & Circumstance

While Mercedes-Benz isn’t the quintessential “cool” car brand, it sure acted like one at an freezing-cold event among rock Gods playing music inside 88,000 pounds of ice. Mercedes performance vehicles took to windy, slippery tracks carved in ice, where festival-goers got to eat, drink and be merry among the brand’s fastest cars. Pomp & Circumstance gave a massive assist in building buzz, gaining influencer attention and media coverage in some of the biggest auto publications in Canada.

For Amica Senior Lifestyles, the agency created #smilesforseniors, where people were encouraged to post inspiring content for older folk in an effort to combat social isolation during the lockdown.

The shop showed off the fitness phenom that is Peloton through broadcast media coverage from eTalk to the Marilyn Dennis Show, infuencer social content and in-store VIP events across the country.