Independent, integrated PR agency, Launch Group, won the prestigious Campaign of the Year Award for its Disney Twinned Town campaign at last night’s PRCA Awards.

The entry also scooped the New Media, Digital and Broadcast Award, was highly commended for the Consumer Award and was a finalist for the Media Relations Award.

Last week the same campaign won a PRWeek Award for Best Use of TV, Radio and Internet, and earlier this year won the Drum Marketing Award for PR Strategy.

The integrated campaign, a world-first, nationwide search to find a UK village, town or city to be twinned with Walt Disney World, was designed to generate wide-spread coverage for the Resort in the UK.

Generating over 780 pieces of coverage including 22 national newspapers, 43 TV items (32 of which were national) and 97 radio interviews, 130 regional newspapers and over 490 online sites, the campaign captured the imagination of the UK press and public.

TV broadcast highlights included being the opening story on ‘Friday Night with Jonathan Ross’, the coveted ‘and Finally’ on ‘ITV News at Ten’ and sparking debate on ‘BBC Breakfast’, who reported live from the Magic Roundabout.  Over 14,500 people visited the microsite and over 500 people entered the search.

Johnny Pitt, CEO of Launch, commented: “We obsess about ‘world-first’ idea innovation, backed by ruthless implementation, and this excellent recognition is reflective of the great work we’re doing week in, week out for our stellar client list.”

Last night at the 24th glittering PRWeek Awards, Launch scooped the award for the Best Use of TV, Radio & Internet for its Walt Disney World ‘Twinned Town’ campaign which achieved more than 660 pieces of coverage in broadcast, online and print media. The story was covered by 43 TV stations and highlights included the opening story on Friday Night with Jonathan Ross, BBC Breakfast and the ‘And Finally’ on News at Ten. Online, more than 100 blogs covered the campaign, and the story was discussed on more than 140 Facebook and MySpace groups and pages, as well as generating over 700 Tweets.  More than 14,500 people visited the microsite.

Next week the same campaign is up for three categories at the PRCA Awards for Media Relations, Consumer and New Media, Digital & Broadcast….. watch this space!

Launch Group has been announced the winner in the sole PR category at the Drum Marketing Awards 2010 for its Walt Disney World Twinned Town campaign.

The Drum Marketing Awards is renowned for recognising outstanding marketing strategy within the UK industry at large, across all marketing disciplines.

Launch Group’s win of the best ‘PR Strategy’ award, resulted from its campaign to find the first-ever town in the UK to be ‘twinned’ with Walt Disney World in Florida, providing massive cultural appeal to the UK media – on and offline.  With Swindon eventually unveiled as the winning twinned town, the campaign achieved over 750 pieces of editorial.  Jonathan Ross opened his Friday night talk show on BBC1 with it and it was the coveted ‘And Finally’ slot on News at Ten.  

Commented Johnny Pitt, CEO, Launch Group: “We love developing big cultural platforms for brands, and the Disney Twinned campaign captured the mood and the agenda of the nation in a huge way.”