In 2007, PubPartout presented its first-ever Pub d’Or Award for truly outstanding acheivement in the cause of preserving the rights of the corporations to advertise above all else. This year, there were two recipients: then Ville-Marie Borough Mayor now disgraced money in brown envelope recipient Benoit Labonte and Helen Fotopolis, then Plateau Borough Mayor, now city councillor for Cote-des-Neiges.
Both had worked tirelessly to permit ad trucks to continue to drive through Montreal’s streets unabated. This was done in the face of concerns for the physical environment as well as the mental environment and logical questions posed to them at council meetings which they dodged like true pros.
Helen Fotopolis received her award during a council meeting and seemed a little too overjoyed to accept the trophy and admit publically that she was actually on our side. In fact, she had CEO Brandon You removed from the meeting without even giving him his two minutes to speak. Her people also had our camera crew ejected, ironically enough just before voting to allow surveillance cameras on St-Laurent boulevard:
Benoit Labonte, on the other hand, did accept his award. Unfortunaltely, Brandon was a little too excited and got into the wrong line, thus forcing Labonte to call him out of order:
With two such deserving recipients, we decided it was enough awards for at least another two years.
Who will win the 2010 Pub d’Or Award? Know someone deserving of this trophy – someone who has done good work in the cause of the spread of corporate advertising – then nominate them at pubdor@pubpartout.com
