The 2006 EFFIE/THE BEST BRAND national award ceremony took place in Moscow's Forum Hall on October 26.

The EFFIE/THE BEST BRAND award first appeared in Russia eight years ago, practically right after the economic crisis, - so it is not surprising that it was received with some degree of distrust at the time. Back then, any prizes or awards, even strictly business-related, were perceived extremely negatively by entrepreneurs. "When the award first came to this country, it resembled a sort of a "brand-builder club", RBC General Director Yury Rovensky recalled, laughing.

"EFFIE/THE BEST BRAND has become an event that unites a community of professionals. It is largely thanks to this competition that brand building has started to be taken seriously: core occupations have come into being; budgets have been created not just for advertising, but also for product promotion and brand building."

"Business is developing intensively in Russia, and the standards that dominated several years ago are becoming obsolete. It is pleasing to realize that that era is now in the past. This is clear from the fact that the market is on the rise, companies are growing in number, competition is strengthening, projects are becoming more advanced, and the effectiveness of marketing solutions is improving."

"If you want to gain prosperity and plan to create a stable business, you must from day one start working towards your company's brand - your business card, your reputation," said the EFFIE/THE BEST BRAND jury chairman and President of the Russian Advertising Academy Vladimir Filippov. "It is a strenuous process, which will require a lot of hard work, but it is impossible to do without it in today's world." Indeed, in the current conditions of tight competition on the Russian market, domestic companies are actively introducing international capital management standards, and are beginning to care with all seriousness about their reputation. Companies are actively accumulating their "image capital."

Construction group MIRAX chief Sergei Polonsky pointed out that "THE BEST BRAND calls for mobilizing all your strength in order to win. And even if we don't, we know that we will lose to a very strong rival. So, we won't feel ashamed of losing to them, because it is in this struggle that the core group of winners is formed."

The need to participate in prestigious competitions like these has become apparent to a predominant majority of businesses by now. And EFFIE/THE BEST BRAND is not just one of the most respected national awards. It is today the country's only competition in this field that has received worldwide recognition and that holds a license from the American Marketing Association (AMA).

It should also be noted that in the few years of its existence, EFFIE/THE BEST BRAND has itself managed to earn a status of a high-quality brand. A record number of 302 submissions was made this year, the all-time high in the award's history. Due to the increase in the number of participants, the award's jury has made a decision to introduce new categories, raising their number to 33. The award is now represented in all Russian regions, with offices set up in each federal district.

Among those attending the award show were politicians, state officials, art workers and businessmen that can boast outstanding powerful brands: Deputy Culture and Mass Communication Minister Dmitry Amunts, VimpelCom's Honorary President Dmitry Zimin, Chairman of the Board of Directors of Wimm-Bill-Dann David Yakobashvili, Chairman of the Board of Directors of Euroset Yevgeny Chichvarkin, MTS Vice President for Finance and Investment Vsevolod Razanov, Arnold Worldwide Managing Partner/ Group Account Director Barbara Reilly, Union of Right Forces (SPS) political party leader Nikita Belykh, producer Iosif Prigozhin, TV presenter Boris Notkin, singer Valeria, artist Nikas Safronov, fashion designer Helen Yarmak, TV soap star Nelly Uvarova, and other figures with highly recognizable brand names.

The informal part of the evening began with an animated film, which in its cheerful manner gave a brief overview of the history of Russian brand building. Then, the specially invited ceremony hosts, Russian television stars Anton Komolov and Yana Churikova, came onto the stage. By tradition, first the bronze rings with a large letter "E" in the middle were handed out, then silver, and finally gold. The letter "E" stands for EFFIE, the world's most prestigious award for effective marketing communications, which THE BEST BRAND joined in 2001.

The headliners of the concert program were popular Russian singer Valeria (with her hit "Nezhnost Moya" ("My sweet one")) and the stellar world famous opera quartet Amici Forever, who have sung before the royal courts of Europe at the most important receptions and ceremonies (the winners of the Milan opera art academy's special prize and a Grand-Prix at the Vienna International Opera Festival). The grand finale of the show was a mystifying Aquatique Show dancing fountains performance, in which water, light, and sound intertwined in the most fascinating way. This high technology art performance made fountains dance in sync with music and lights. The spectators were stunned with excitement when a 30-meter spout of water would shoot up in the air and perform acrobatic stunts to Tchaikovsky's musical masterpieces. Though it must be said that fountains did as great a job to other kinds of rhythms as well, from jive to step.

Representatives of participating companies stressed the competition's exceptional importance to forming corporate culture. The general impression of the members of the jury was that it was the brands that worked with consumer goods (foods, children's goods, electronics) that performed best this year. There was also unexpectedly strong performance from the mass media.

The Grand Prix was awarded to three projects this year: Aeroflot - Russian Airlines ("Change of Image"), MegaFon ("Reputation and Credibility"), and the family bonus card loyalty program Malina ("New Name"). The remaining 108 brands won gold (40), silver (41) and bronze (27) prizes.

In the words of Vladimir Filippov, the main thing is that the competition has shown the essence of brand to our advertising and marketing specialists: "this is seen in the way that the submissions were written, in how brands being promoted and how goals were set, as well as what results were achieved - not only in sales, but also in customer loyalty. For the most part, the jury assesses how well and professionally the submission is written. Then it compares the budget with the targets that were set, and tries to assess complexity of the market situation.