So all the papers are in and we’re working out the final tally. It looks like a very good year. 

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There are some really juicy flavours of strategy in evidence and a huge variety of agencies submitting. 

So a huge thank you to everyone who worked so hard to get them in on time. We're martinets when it comes to deadlines but it's in a good cause: rigour! 

Each paper is read by at least 4 judges to be sure that everyone gets a fair hearing. 
It's a mountain of reading and marking and we have to get them all out to the short listers first thing Monday so they can start their ascent.

As DE&I policies undergo a seismic transatlantic shock, the APG strongly believes in the importance of representation. After all the job of the planner has always been to get inside peoples’ heads and lives to understand them better. 

But what do we mean by representation? Is it realistic to even try to reflect the nation? And is it counted in hires or lived experience?

The APG Creative Strategy Awards has always celebrated strategic brilliance. For 2025, we're amplifying that mission by opening our doors wider than ever before. As Chair of The Shortlist Jury, I'm thrilled to announce not only an extraordinary panel of judges drawn from across the strategic spectrum, but also a series of exciting changes to the awards themselves - all designed to discover and celebrate strategic excellence wherever it exists.

From utopian to dystopian scenarios, the APG is working with planners, internationally, to game out what the possibilities might be and how we can get there.

This is a brand new APG course for Strategy Directors. You may have been promoted relatively recently or you’re about to take the step up. Either way you’re a highly capable strategist with plenty of experience but you now need to embrace a different mindset and start leading the business and the team.

As the Chair of Judges for the APG Creative Strategy Awards 2025, I am thrilled to announce that this year we want to welcome entries from as far and wide as possible - to broaden out the awards so they truly represent and celebrate every flavour of strategy.

Michael Hines will be sharing hard, practical, useful advice on how to handle new product launches, using launches for Ford, McDonald's, Samsung, Nike, Old Spice and Clash of Clans to highlight what works and doesn’t, how launches can be a path to the upper echelons of client organisations, and how working on launches can bring in truly imaginative thinking and ground-breaking marketing practice.