Two Kerker campaigns received top honors in the same week from industries that could not be more different: entertainment and the law. Votes were tallied this week in the International Association of Amusement Parks and Attractions (IAAPA) awards and the Minnesota Legal Marketing Association awards for 2007 and Kerker creative for the Minnesota Zoo and Minneapolis trial law firm Robins, Kaplan, Miller and Ciresi were each awarded first prize in their respective categories.

The Minnesota Zoo campaign entered into the IAAPA awards won in the radio category for a branded spot that took a humorous look at animals in advertising that have represented brands over the years: the Gekko for Geico car insurance, Chimpanzees for CareerBuilder.com and many more.

Kerker picked up another win for the creative campaign: Our Africa: Summer on the Savanna. Based on the idea of African animals visiting Minnesota, the campaign featured people dressed in caricature animal costumes visiting Minnesota tourist milestones such as the Walker Sculpture Garden’s spoon and cherry sculpture and Nicollet Mall’s statue tribute to Mary Tyler Moore’s famous TV hat toss. This integrated campaign also included out of home posters, magazine print ads showing the same animals, collateral “passports” on each animal and a :30 second TV spot that resembles a slideshow of vacation snaps complete with carousel clicks as each image changes. In the Minnesota Chapter of the Legal Marketing Association awards, Kerker’s work for Robins, Kaplan, Miller and Ciresi took first prize for best legal advertising campaign in Minnesota. The campaign is designed to raise brand awareness of one of Minnesota’s most pre-eminent and experienced trial law firms. It features bold, stark magazine ads that stop a reader in their tracks with bold block color and sharp, cutting copy: “want a fancy magazine ad? Turn the page. Want a trial lawyer? Tear this out.”

“Diversity is important to Kerker in everything we do,” says Chris Preston, Kerker’s creative leader. “We truly value individual and often opposing creative viewpoints and approaches. It makes our work richer, deeper and more multi-faceted plus we have a lot of fun arguing the point. So it’s incredibly gratifying when our campaign creative is recognized in such radically different industries, particularly when that work helps our clients build their profiles and reputations in their own worlds.”