Interview with Lucia Ongay Co-Founder of the Gerety Awards as they Announce a Deadline Extension and Coronavirus (COVID-19) Reorganisation

Mar. 23, 2020

What is an overall description of your award show?

Launched in January 2019 the Gerety Awards is named for Frances Gerety, the copywriter who coined the slogan "A diamond is forever,". The Gerety Awards recognizes global talent, mentors and allies within advertising—the people who will define and refine the standard to which advertising should be held.

What's your differentiating position vs other award shows?

The Gerety Awards marks the first time a jury's been united to select the best in advertising—all advertising, not just advertising made for women—through the female lens. Women make 80 percent of purchasing choices so it creates a benchmark that is relevant to the market reality. The judging sessions held around the world are unique and the winners chosen set an important benchmark for the very best in advertising and creative communication.

What is the new deadline for entries?

The deadline has been extended until April 17.

What's the judging process?

The judging is done in two stages. Firstly the Executive Jury sessions create the shortlist and then the Grand Jury make the final selection defining the overall winners.

We have made preparations to move to remote online judging. The jury sessions in June had been planned for London, New York, Bangkok, Johannesburg, Melbourne, Madrid, Berlin, Buenos Aires, Helsinki and Istanbul. These judging sessions create an overall shortlist, and choose agency and production company of the year from their country. 

As the only ad award show to hold judging sessions in 10 different cities over a 2 week period how are you preparing for the Coronavirus (COVID-19)?

Our voting system allows us to move all judging to remote online voting. We have been in contact with all of this year’s jury and we are closely monitoring the situation. The uniqueness and the important value of the Gerety Awards taking the female vision of advertising determined by leading female creatives from around the world does not change if we are required to stop in person judging.

A benefit of moving the votes online for this year is that we can extend the time the jury will have to vote in their own time and announce the winners the week of October 19. The Gerety Award winners will be the benchmark for other award shows taking place later in the year. 

How do you think Coronavirus (COVID-19) will affect other industry events?

Advertising is a very versatile industry so we have no doubt that it will adapt to the climate. That said, events are postponing until this crisis passes. Regardless of what other events do, what we hope to do with Gerety is prove the importance of representation. When women get to decide what work actually speaks the most persuasively, I think we'll be surprised how much more interesting our idea of what great work is, and who makes it, becomes.