The awards are part of the DMA's long-term consumer PR campaign and follow on from the launch of mydm.co.uk in November. School children from years seven to 10 were invited to devise a direct marketing campaign, including a direct mail piece to promote one of the three charities supporting the campaign - The Woodland Trust, veterinary charity PDSA and Macmillan Cancer Support.
The winners were The Mount School (London) for its campaign for Macmillan, Bradford Girls Grammar School (North East) for The Woodland Trust, and St Michael's RC School (North East) for PDSA.
"The response from schools has been fantastic. The effort that has gone into the award entries is phenomenal," says Mike Barnes, director of marketing and business development at the DMA. "The schools' feedback to the scheme has been positive. We hope the Young Direct Marketing Awards will become a regular fixture on the school agenda and get DM on the curriculum."
The Awards promote national curriculum objectives across all four years, fostering creativity in the use of language and design and providing practical experience in planning a business campaign and understanding the principles behind marketing.
Entries were received from more than 180 teams of school children from across the UK. The initial round of judging in June saw 180 entries whittled down to 15 regional winners in two age groups - years seven to eight and years nine to 10. The three national winning campaigns were announced at the Grand Final. The judges included Arc creative directors, Aaron Martin and Gary Munns, direct marketing managers from each charity involved and Heather Westgate, managing director at TDA and chairwoman of the 2006 DMA Awards.
Westgate says: "The quality of thought and the creative executions were of a high standard - some students were surprisingly strategic in their approach, they answered the brief well and it was easy to see how the ideas would generate results."
Woodland Trust direct marketing manager Phil Shipway says: "There was some good creative work that professional copywriters would have been proud to put their name to. Most people thinking about a career in marketing don't consider DM, they are more likely to look at advertising, PR or journalism. This is a good way of showing that there is more to a career in marketing than producing glossy TV ads."
PDSA head of direct marketing John Cole says: "I was impressed by the freeness of the childrens' thinking and the logic applied to solving problems. We thought the concept we chose, 'Paws for Thought', would fit well into the way we're positioning ourselves in the market. We have a campaign called 'Give Something Back' and this and 'Paws for Thought' fit well together."
Each of the winners received a trophy for their school, and the winning campaign for each charity will be created and executed in the school's region.
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