• Digital Native Academy Ltd – The Regional Outstanding Business Development Award
• Electric Cinema (vid via Pete Ashton) – The Birmingham Outstanding Business Development Award
• LHM Media – Innovation Award
• Fierce Earth Ltd (vid via Pete Ashton) – Outstanding Market Development Award
  (with a Special Commendation Award in the same category presented to D A Recordings Ltd)
• IE Design – The Best Brand Award
• Stan’s Cafe – Creative Industries Award

Fine winners all (with deserving nominees in all categories) so hearty congrats to all involved.

That’s the official business done, so now I’m going to get on my soapbox and talk about what I see as pretty fundamental problems with the Creative City Awards concept. My top 3 nominees are:

1. The emphasis on financial performance
2. Stagnation. Half the winners had won Creative City Awards before. Do the awards celebrate the city’s diverse and vibrant creative sector or the usual names?
3. Only 45 nominations across 7 categories were received and the Newcomer Award had to be withdrawn. I don’t know which to be most embarrassed about

The initial emphasis on the business side of things is understandable. Until last year the awards were only open to companies that had received support under the Business Support for the Creative Industries programme, so that was fair enough. That’s why the awards are for things like ‘business development’, ‘best brand’ and ‘market development’.

The emphasis is supposed to have shifted though – as Coun Neville Summerfield said (at 10 mins 50s), the awards are intended to serve as:

a fitting platform to publicly recognise the work that is being done by creative companies in Birmingham and the wider region

Which seems an almighty stretch given the restrictions in place. As Stef said “wouldn’t a better name for the event be the Creative Business Awards?“. That seems realistic at least.

The thing that really racked me off on the night (I was a guest of the Birmingham Post) was Neville Summerfield’s statement (at 6mins) that:

the Creative City Awards received over 40 submission entries, which is a great testament to the strength and depth of creative business in the city

Over 40? Across 7 categories? Is that all the city’s good for? As I discovered last week, the withdrawl of the Newcomer Award was:

due to the limited number of nominations and the fact that the nominated businesses had not been trading long enough to provide evidence of performance

If we’re relying on what the Creative City Awards tell us then that’s a shocking indictment of the city’s creative scene. Happily, we’re not and the lesson from this is that you should always apply for awards – there might be hardly any competition.

Still, despite all that, I do believe awards ceremonies of this type serve a useful purpose (and I only criticise because I care). They act as a focal point for the sector, bring people – both within the sector and outside it – together, provide a neat package that can be promoted outside the region and are a showcase for the winners and nominees.

I’ll end by quoting the wise words of James Yarker of Stan’s Cafe who has written about their latest success on their blog:

It’s easy to be cynical about awards (I have been many times myself) but if you take them in the correct spirit they can do a useful job for you. I hope that more arts companies may take our place next year. Although the awards are focused in a business direction it feels important that the Arts continue to be represented otherwise the City’s Creativity is in danger of being assumed to consist merely of Digital Solutions to clients various marketing/distribution/communication problems being found almost exclusively by young-ish white men sat in front of spanking new white macintosh computers.

Let’s put ourselves about a bit – the city would be too sterile without us

Thanks to Mohammed Zahir at Birmingham City Council (Q1-5) and Kenny at Big Cat PR (Q6 & 7) for finding time to answer these:

1. How many applications were received for each of the categories?
   We had a total of 45 nominations from which we shortlisted 17 businesses across the various categories.
2. Will further information on the reasons behind the nominations be released?
   The shortlisting was based upon a rigorous assessment of each nomination in accordance with strict eligibility criteria, an application form and related financial information.  Each shortlisted company then had to make a 10 minute presentation to a panel. The quality of the applications from the shortlisted companies was good and the process was very competitive.
3. Has the Newcomer Award been dropped from the Awards? If so, how come?
   The newcomer award has been dropped due to the limited number of nominations and the fact that the nominated businesses had not been trading long enough to provide evidence of performance.
4. With so many self-employed and freelance workers in this sector, what scope is there for the Creative City Awards to recognise the efforts of individuals rather than companies?
   The awards are designed to recognise and reward business success. Individuals registered as self employed  are eligible and have not been excluded.
5. Of this year’s 14 finalists, 4 won awards last year – what does this say about ‘the city’s diverse and vibrant creative sector‘?
   The 14 finalists are of a high calibre, successful businesses and indeed benchmarks for success within the sector.
6. Who is on the judging panel?
   Simon Jelley (MCL), Julia Higginbottom (Aquila), Mohammed Zahir (BCC), Lara Ratnaraja (Business Link WM), Joe McConnell (Biztv), Ian Danby, Arts Council, Carol Alderson (BCC), Shasta Rashid (BCC)
7. Who was responsible for designing the logo?
   Jason Liggitt at Big Cat’s design studio created the logo.

Here are the Creative City Awards finalists, with thanks to Big Cat (who provided the list) and Dave Harte (who provided the links):

The Regional Outstanding Business Development Award:
Bubblequest Ltd
Internet Arrow
Digital Native Academy Ltd

The Birmingham Outstanding Business Development Award:
Electric Cinema
Substrakt Limited (blog)

Innovation Award:
Adwords Expert Ltd
LHM Media (blog)
IE Design Consultancy Ltd (blog)

Outstanding Market Development Award:
Fierce Earth Ltd (blog)
D A Recordings Ltd (blog)
Fused (blog)

The Best Brand Award:
D A Recordings Ltd (blog)
Violectra trading as Unison Strings Ltd
IE Design Consultancy Ltd (blog)

Creative Industries Award:
D A Recordings Ltd (blog)
Stan’s Cafe (blog)
Fierce Earth Ltd (blog)

The awards themselves are on 29 Nov.

Firstly, congrats to all the peeps nominated – no matter your opinion on awards generally, a bit of free publicity and a £2,000 cheque is reason enough to try and win one of these.  A few thoughts on the nominations though:

• Does SEO (Internet Arrow) count as ‘creative’ these days?
• Just how is business consultancy (Bubblequest) ‘creative’?
• Pay-per-click advertising (Adwords Ltd)? ‘Creative’? Eh?

3 of the 14 companies nominated (21%) have got me scratching my head and wondering why they’re there. No offence to the companies nominated, of course, but did the organisers not receive any more relevant applications? Is that why there’s only two nominations for the Birmingham business development award?

*Update* – Parboo (not her real name) has noticed that there’s been no announcement of nominations for the Newcomer Award.

Birmingham City Council has launched an ‘X Factor’ style hunt to find the city’s top undiscovered talent, offering them a chance to perform in front of many of the city’s most influential creative industry and media figures.

Entertainers of all genres, whether magicians, dancers, circus acts, singers, groups or comedians, are being invited to take part, with the winner claiming an exclusive performance spot at the 2008 Creative
City Awards Ceremony, being held on November 29th at the ICC

Auditions will be held at The Custard Factory at the end of October. The successful candidates will be judged by the creative and events teams behind the Creative City Awards.

For more information, or to enter the competition, please send a short e-mail introducing yourself and your act to ed.king@bcguk.com, or alternatively call Ed at BIG CAT Group on (0121) 200 0910.

Thoughts?  Anyone going to have a go?

**UPDATE** – actually, from the looks of the comment by Ed below, it looks like this isn’t happening.  Or something’s happening but in a different format.

were created by Birmingham City Council to recognise and reward achievement from within the city’s diverse and vibrant creative sector

and, carrying on from last year, they’re open to all small, creative businesses in the Birmingham & Solihull area.

There are 7 categories:

1. Creative Industries Award
2. Innovation Award
3. Outstanding Business Development (Birmingham) Award
4. Outstanding Business Development (Regional) Award
5. Best Newcomer Award
6. Outstanding Market Development Award
7. Best Brand Award

and the deadline for entries is 17 October.  Good luck to any and all who apply – details and forms are on Birmingham Council’s Creative City Awards page.