HispanicBusiness

A grass-roots, civic-pride campaign for Visit Florida won the Best of Show nod for Miami-based advertising agency Alma at the 2012 AdFed Miami ADDY Competition.

Alma received the only Best of Show award this year, across all categories of media, an unusual distinction. The agency also won two gold statuettes and 14 silvers -- notable especially because the jury overall awarded 50 percent fewer entries than last year, according to a news release.

The Visit Florida campaign "Beach Walk" featured an organic, one-day event to rally ordinary people to walk every inch of the Sunshine State's 825 miles of coastline to show the world that the beaches were open for business -- even during the massive oil spill.

"It's a matter of pride for everyone at Alma to have had such a great performance at the ADDY," said Luis Miguel Messianu, president and CCO of Alma. "Winning the ONLY Best of Show demonstrates that our spirit of collaboration, both internally and with our clients, yields great results. We are honored to win on behalf of a variety of clients and with such a diverse body of work."

Alma also took home ADDYs for its work for McDonald's, including the "Asian Salad: Chopsticks" print ad, the "Monopoly" radio campaign, the "Hypothesis" TV spot and the "Strawberry Lemonade Burst" case.

A print campaign for Tobacco Free Florida "Tobacco Free" was also awarded by the ADDY juries.

Earlier this year, Alma was ranked sixth on the Advertising Age Agency A-List.

The agency was also the most awarded at the 2011 ADDYs, winning the Best of Show in the print category and taking home the most awards of the night in both the English and non-English categories.