Hands up if you missed the 2009 ADMA Awards in Sydney.

For all those who weren’t able to get out of the office, onto a plane, over the bridge and into the city, here’s your chance to see who won, and – more importantly – why they won.

At the ADMA Awards 2009 Showcase, Dylan Taylor, the 2009 Chair of Creative Judges, will present last year’s winning entries and give us a behind the scenes glimpse into what the judges were looking for. So while Shane ‘Kenny‘ Jacobson won’t be presenting in Melbourne, the laughs will be replaced with insights into how to win next year.

Take that, Sydneysiders!

Our eDM for the event went out a little while ago, but there’s still time to reserve your seat.

So if you’d like to see what made the grade in 2009 and network over drinks and canapes, book your tickets here and we’ll see you there.

Last week, we waved goodbye to the man who thinks eating fruit after dark is weird.

Yes, Mickey T, our Studio Manager (and regular contributor to our Cubism wall), has headed off to London.

His farewell party appropriately involved an afternoon of Foosball (Mickey’s team won, Brendan’s team lost) and far too many drinks at the local pub. And though he’ll be sorely missed, Mickey’s promised to keep those Cubisms coming over via email – which will no doubt keep us all amused.

Before Mickey left he formally handed over his keyboard to our new Finished Artist – David Santolin aka DJ d-vise. That’s right, now we have a resident funk/disco/hip hop DJ in the office!

We’re bugging him to bring in his decks and mix it up this Friday during 80’s hour.

He’s not convinced…yet.

But don’t worry, we’ll keep chipping away.

And if we’re unsuccessful, we’ll just have to organize an agency excursion to his Saturday night gig at First Floor on Brunswick Street.

So welcome to CUBED, David. We’re thrilled to have you on board – and pleased to know that keyboard is in safe hands.

Yesterday marked CUBED’s fifth birthday.

We celebrated with balloons and cupcakes (like any good five-year old) and champagne (like a five-year old Drew Barrymore).

Kim made a speech, Mike made a toast, we all got a little giddy on sugar and bubbly and heard about the beginnings of the agency (which involved Kim’s home office,  Mike’s mother’s dining table and a shared laptop).

It’s a far cry from the CUBED of 2010.

Our fifth birthday cupcakes were scoffed by 20 full-time staff who (when they’re not celebrating) work on some of Australia’s best-known household names including ANZ, TRUenergy, Australia Post and V/Line.

So ladies and gents, charge your glasses and drink a birthday toast to CUBED.

We sure as hell did!

Each year, National Pharmacies runs a promotion that’s hard to resist – an extra 5% off for members.

They already get 20% off all their purchases, so this bumps it up to a whopping 25% off pretty much everything in store.

To promote this offer to members this year, we created a self-mailer, die-cut to resemble a National Pharmacies’ bag full of goodies. After all, what could be more motivating than seeing a bag full of the items you can get a juicy discount on?

Truth be told, several of us are already champing at the bit to get our hands on that Chanel perfume….OK, that’s enough drooling, back to work.

(But if all this is tempting you to sign up as a National Pharmacies member, just click here.)

This Sunday will see the ‘Run For The Kids’ take over the streets of Melbourne (much like the weather did last weekend).

The race, conducted annually to raise money for our Royal Children’s Hospital, takes competitors on a rather scenic 14.6 kilometre (that’s right folks – 14.6 kilometre) course starting at Kings Domain, through the Domain Tunnel over the Bolte Bridge back into the city via the Docklands, past the Arts Centre and finishing up where they started.

This year’s run sees National Pharmacies step up as a major sponsor and anyone that knows CUBED knows we’re always up for supporting a client – particularly when it’s for a good cause. In fact it’s the sixth children’s charity we’ve helped out in the last 12 months.

So joining 29,996 other runners will be The CUBED team, consisting of Production Manager Brendan “Lone Wolf” Hanrahan, Art Director Daniel “The Kid” Gretch, Account Manager Laura “Bunny” Campbell and Creative Director Dave “Old Man” Scott.

Though Laura is unwilling to state publicly what time we should expect from her, Dan and Brendan are a safe bet for no more than an hour 15, whereas Dave is already making excuses in case he’s still not finished until next Tuesday.

If you’re in the area, pop on down and give them a cheer, or if you’d like to donate a couple of dollars to the Royal Children’s Hospital yourself and support a great cause without having to get blisters just click here.

On Saturday, February 27, CUBED Business Director Chantelle Warren walked down the aisle and became a Lane (badda bing!).

Our Chants married handsome Maori songster Adam Lane on Torquay beach in a fun ceremony where Adam promised to buy her a coffee before every road trip and Chantelle promised to never say he had too many guitars.

After a long and lively reception, the bride and groom made it home. At 4am.

Congratulations from all of us to Mr and Mrs Lane.

Client: ADMA

Product: Guru Breakfast

Medium: Direct Mail

To promote the first ADMA Guru Breakfast of 2010, we created a breakfasty mail pack. The outer envelope mimicked an packet of instant porridge with an oat-covered invitation inside. The copy was just as playful – instead of a ‘use by’ date, we had an ‘rsvp by’ date and the event was promoted as being ‘high in ROI’.

If you’re an Aussie direct marketer, you may have recently received our little pack of oats in your mailbox.

It was created to promote ADMA’s Guru Breakfasts – a series of presentations delivered by various direct marketing experts. For this morning’s kick-off breakfast, Alan ‘Dr Direct’ Rosenspan flew in from America to explain how to get more from your marketing dollar. (And, perhaps, to track down a decent cup of coffee.)

We’re pleased to report that the Guru Breakfast series is off to a very healthy start. Less than a week after the mail pack hit desks around Victoria, the event had completely sold out.

So if you managed to secure a place at the breakfast table this morning, we hope you found the presentation enlightening, the breakfast delicious and the coffee hot.

And if you missed out this time, keep an eye out for the other Guru Breakfasts ADMA will be serving up throughout the year.