• by Staff Writers , June 4, 2009

What if your product simply disappeared? Would anyone care? Burger King's clever campaign by Crispin Porter + Bogusky, which effectively dared to ask that question, has won the 41st Grand Effie.

"Burger King won convincingly due to their boldness and creativity across multiple media platforms, delivering real cultural relevance and above all, outstanding business results," said Carl Johnson, Chairman of the Board of Directors of Effie Worldwide and Co-Founder of Anomaly.

To coincide with the 50th anniversary of the Whopper, Burger King conducted a social experiment removing the iconic Whopper from the menu. The first phase of the experiment explored deprivation to see what would happen if the item was removed from the menu forever without any announcement.

Phase two took the social experiment to another level when, in lieu of the Whopper, customers were given competitors' burgers. Burger King launched a series of TV spots to drive traffic to "Whopperfreakout.com," where people could view an eight-minute documentary on the experiment. The film was linkable and uploadable to blogs and social networking sites, serving as a catalyst for interaction. As a result of the campaign, Whopper quarterly sales increased by double digits.

Other Grand Effie finalists included Anomaly and Converse for "Domaination," DDB Seattle and McDonald's for "Unsnobby Coffee," Energy BBDO and Canadian Club for "Damn Right," MindShare and Suave and Sprint for "In The Motherhood," and TBWAChiatDay and Pedigree for Pedigree "Echo."

Brands with at least two Effie wins each include Allstate, Canadian Club, Clorox Green Works, Converse, McDonald's, New York Lottery, Nintendo, Old Spice, Sun Chips and the U.S. Army.

Out of the 24 Gold Effies awarded, independent agencies brought home seven, while Omnicom was the holding company with the most Gold Effie winning campaigns (six). MDC won three Gold Effies, and the remaining Gold Effies were spread out among the industry's holding companies.

DDB won 11 Effies, the most of any agency in the competition, including three Gold, six Silver and two Bronze trophies.

More details on the campaigns and brands for each winner can be found here.