Members of The Marketing Society have voted Cancer Research UK as its Brave Brand of the Year, in association with Campaign and sponsored by IBM iX, at its annual dinner in London.
The charity won acclaim, as well as stoking controversy, over its campaign “Obesity is a cause of cancer too“, which featured posters based on the designs of cigarette packs. The campaign won a Campaign Big Award for agency Anomaly in October.
Cancer Research UK won a live vote of more than 500 senior marketers from a shortlist of five brands, with the others being KFC, Carlsberg, Nationwide and Lucozade Sport.
They had been chosen from an initial list of 20, which also included the likes of Virgin Atlantic, Channel 4 and last year’s winner Bodyform.
The most iconic brand
To mark the 60th anniversary of the Marketing Society, attendees also voted for the most iconic brand of the last six decades, sponsored by Deloitte Digital, with Coca-Cola emerging victorious.
An initial list of 60 brands, one chosen for each year, was whittled down to five, with John Lewis, IBM, easyJet and Channel 4 also making the shortlist.
