LASALLE students win 2016 24-hour Crowbar advertising challenge for AsiaOne

SINGAPORE - Three students from LASALLE College of the Arts came in tops at this year's Crowbar Challenge, beating 18 other teams to come up with the best marketing campaign for news and lifestyle website AsiaOne.

Amos Chew, Larries Ng and Tiffany Tan, took home $500 in vouchers and a large bar of chocolate shaped as a crowbar on Friday night at the Crowbar Awards, which was held at the Singapore Chinese Chamber of Commerce.

Four students from Nanyang Academy of Fine Arts came in second, while five students from Temasek Polytechnic came in third for the 24-hour Crowbar Challenge.

The challenge is a component of the annual Crowbar Awards, where participants rush against the clock to deliver the best proposal to a real-world client.

A 24-hour deadline may seem crazy to some, but to the trio - who are currently pursuing a degree in design communication and majoring in advertising - it was an opportunity to show the judges their creativity.

Chew even told AsiaOne that they didn't sleep during the challenge, which was held from July 21 to 22.  

"We just wanted to give our best, so we gave it our all," said Chew, 25.

In fact, all three students spent the night in the AsiaOne office, working hard the whole night and morning to come up with the perfect pitch and proposal.

So what was the big idea that had the judges sold? Their concept "Newsbits", which aims to provide bite-sized news to readers across multiple channels.

Ms Karen Lim, acting editor at AsiaOne said their proposal was "on point".

"The winning team had a strong concept right from the start. We were sold almost immediately. It wasn't just creative, it also addressed our brief most accurately," said Ms Lim.

Only seven teams were shortlisted to present their campaign proposals to a panel of judges from Singapore Press Holdings Digital, as well as representatives from advertising and creative firms DDB, Publicis Singapore, and Republic Studios.

Creative director from Publicis Singapore Adrian Yeap told AsiaOne that "it was very clear" when it came to choosing the winner.

He explained that he picked the winning work because it was "brave".

"Brave enough to think big and in a way that will hopefully inspire others.

"On top of that, it demonstrated a strong understanding of human behaviour which is at the core of all the strongest ideas," said the 34-year-old.

When asked how they found the challenge, 24-year-old Ng said: "In the advertising industry, you can never know what the client might want, so it was actually tough for us."

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