Houston Ballet Takes Top Honors at Crystal Awards

Houston Ballet took top honors in two categories in the Crystal Awards, recognizing marketing excellence: Marketing Campaign- Non Profit for the marketing campaign for performances of Houston Ballet's holiday favorite The Nutcracker; and Product or Service Brochure- Two or more for Houston Ballet's 2011-12 season subscription brochures.

Each year, the Houston chapter of the American Marketing Association (AMA) sponsors The Crystal Awards to spotlight the best marketing work in a variety of categories. A select panel of national marketing professionals traveled to Houston to judge over 600 entries in the competition from companies, organizations and institutions. This year's Crystal Awards ceremony was held on Thursday, May 17th, 2012 at the Hyatt Regency Hotel. For more information on other category winners in the competition, visit http://www.crystalawards.org/.

"Houston Ballet's marketing department has had a stellar year, winning two Crystal Awards in May and winning two Marketer of the Year Awards in two categories from AMA Houston in March," commented Houston Ballet Executive Director James Nelson. "In 2011, Houston Ballet experienced our highest sales ever in the company's 39 year history of performing The Nutcracker, with almost 73,000 audience members sharing the magic of this holiday tradition. Houston Ballet is blessed with an extremely talented, passionately committed marketing and communications team, the majority of whom have worked for Houston Ballet for over five years and some for more than a decade. Their loyalty and creativity play a vital role in helping introduce new, diverse audiences to the magic of dance and the art of Houston Ballet."

The creative team for the two winning campaigns included Bomar Design for the design of the 2011-12 subscription brochures and Nutcracker direct mail and print advertising; and Katy Bomar Creative, for the copy, concepts and production for The Nutcracker television and radio commercials.

Finalists in the category of Marketing Campaign- Non Profit include: Texas Children's Hospital (US News & World Reports Rankings Campaign), Houston Symphony (2011-12 Subscription Campaign), Brand Extract (Boy Scouts Dodgeball) and University of Houston (Tier One campaign).
Finalists in the category of Product or Service Brochure- Two or more include: Axiom and Cameron (Discover Cameron Brochures), Catch the Moment (RFID Case Study – Sports Illustrated and Nissan), Edge Creative Strategies (E.E. Reed Construction), MBCI (Eco-ficient Branding Campaign).