The Loeries (The Loerie Awards Company NPC) is a non-profit company administering awards for the brand communications industry, in Africa and the Middle East.

History

The Loerie Awards first took place in 1978 in

Johannesburg Johannesburg ( , , ; Zulu language, Zulu and Xhosa language, Xhosa: eGoli ) (colloquially known as Jozi, Joburg, Jo'burg or "The City of Gold") is the most populous city in South Africa. With 5,538,596 people in the City of Johannesburg alon ...

. Television was introduced to South Africa relatively late in 1976, and the delay was due to the political belief at the time that television was "undesirable". Once television had finally been introduced, the first television commercials commenced in 1978, and consequently, the Loerie Awards were introduced in the same year to promote the new medium of television advertising. Since 1978, new categories were regularly added and today the awards include not only traditional advertising, but recognise virtually every touch-point between a brand and the consumer - including architecture, design, digital media, live events, sponsorship, as well as integrated campaigns. In 2004, the Loeries were almost "consigned to the scrap heap." Until then, the awards were managed by the Marketing Federation of South Africa, but they were rescued by the Association for Communication and Advertising (ACA) South Africa and the Creative Circle South Africa who formed a new non-profit company to run the awards. After the inaugural awards in

in 1978, the awards were held for many years at Sun City until 2004. In 2005 the Loeries moved to

Margate, KwaZulu-Natal Margate is a coastal resort town in the KwaZulu-Natal province, about 20 kilometres (12.4 mi) south-west of Port Shepstone and 127 kilometres (78.9 mi) south-west of Durban. The river which flows into the sea at Margate is called "Nkhongweni" ''(p ...

, then to

Cape Town Cape Town is the legislature, legislative capital city, capital of South Africa. It is the country's oldest city and the seat of the Parliament of South Africa. Cape Town is the country's List of municipalities in South Africa, second-largest ...

in 2009, and in 2015 the awards will be hosted for the first time in

Durban Durban ( ; , from meaning "bay, lagoon") is the third-most populous city in South Africa, after Johannesburg and Cape Town, and the largest city in the Provinces of South Africa, province of KwaZulu-Natal. Situated on the east coast of South ...

, KwaZulu-Natal. Preetesh Sewraj has been the Chief Executive Officer since 2020 and Sibusiso Sitole is the current Chairperson.

Loeries Creative Week

It has been estimated that Loeries Creative Week is worth ZAR100 million (approximately US$10 million). Creative Week is a week long festival that begins with the judging of all the work. Over 160 judges from across the region as well as international jury chairmen assess the work. Finalists are announced every day and judging is concluded with a recently introduced "Seminar of Creativity." The winning work is announced on the Saturday and Sunday evenings at the end of the week.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Loeries, The South African awards Advertising awards 1978 establishments in South Africa