Allied Global Marketing were the Grand Prix winners at the 31^st annual APMC Star Awards, held in Fallon & Byrne’s Exchange Suite on Thursday night, the 10^th of April.  Their campaign, ‘Heineken – Player 0.0’ for Heineken Ireland won 3 Gold Stars, in addition to the coveted Grand Prix for a campaign that demonstrated innovation, ingenuity and creative excellence.

Speaking on behalf of the judging panel, Jimmy Murphy, one of Ireland’s foremost advertising and communications leaders, commented ‘It was a pleasure to judge the APMC Star Awards 2025. Another stellar year of world-class creativity, executed with extremely high levels of craft and flair. The ingenuity of the creative community in this country is on display throughout, and we were particularly impressed with the high standard of some newer brands in this market. Promotional Marketing remains a key driver for ambitious brands, and – although judging represents a big investment of time – I can speak for the whole panel by saying it was an honour to be involved’.

The agency that secured the highest number of Gold Stars was CMS Marketing who were honoured with no fewer than 7 Gold awards, including the highly competitive Creative Gold trophy for their work with Paddy Power. CMS also took Gold awards for An Post and for The Muff Liquor Company, and were recognised for the third year in a row for their work with Bank of Ireland. Another huge winner on the night was InSight Marketing who secured thirteen Stars across a broad range of categories – including Gold Stars for Nestlé, Maxol and Persil & Comfort. The InSight team was also recognised for their creativity in the Lynx Fine Fragrance Collection campaign. Among their haul of 6 Stars, Verve The Live Agency took Gold across several categories, for The Coca-Cola Company; Diageo/Smirnoff and for Glenveagh Properties, which took the Gold for the newly introduced and very competitive Best Brand Roadshow Category. Mixtape Marketing had a great night with 4 Stars, including Gold for their UCD Student Job Summit. Pluto walked away with 5 Stars – once again being recognised for their compelling work with Pieta and for their Breast Cancer Ireland, THIS IS A SIGN campaign.  New entrant, TITAN Experience, were awarded their first ever APMC Gold Star for Fyffes Ireland’s Fittest School while OLIVER took 3 awards for their work for McDonald’s Ireland and Bank of Ireland. Real Nation, goosebump and Elevator Promotional Marketing each took several Stars home in what was a record-breaking year for entries across all 21 categories. 

The APMC was proud to recognise the 2025 Rising Star of our industry – agencies were invited to nominate individuals from their teams who demonstrate outstanding abilities – young achievers, innovators and thinkers. Five outstanding young marketeers were nominated, and Louise Carey, from Allied Global Marketing was crowned the winner.

“We are thrilled to see so many agencies participate and win Star Awards” said Ian McCabe, on behalf of the Board of the APMC.  “We once again broke our record for both the numbers and sources of entries, with 16 different agencies participating in the competition. We are proud to honour the campaigns which really deliver results for our clients. It shows the depth of talent and expertise in the Irish market; all the campaigns that were shortlisted and won Stars are worthy winners and we as an Association are thrilled to celebrate and congratulate them”.    

All winners are eligible to go on to compete against the best of the best in Europe at the European Association of Communications Agencies IMPACT awards which are scheduled to be open for entries in the summer.

The APMC Star Awards are kindly supported by Element London; Mando; Return2Sender; Hayes Solicitors; IMJ; Horizon Digital Print; Fillit; McCul Clothing; Global and Session Hire.