Agency Leo Burnett,

Agency Leo Burnett, Chicago



When creative director/art director Noel Haan came up with a concept for Altoid’s new younger-skewing line, the solution seemed obvious: Comic strips would introduce the client’s strips. “It’s almost like the execution is the strategy,” says creative director G. Andrew Meyer.

Altoids, which got the Grand Kelly in 1998, wanted to fine-tune the “Curiously strong and original” theme for “a younger bar crowd, people who are socially active,” says Meyer. “That category is more about social interaction than breath freshening.”

They hired comic-book illustrator Charles Burns, author of the graphic novel Black Hole, to illustrate the five executions.