IPRA Golden World Awards for Excellence announced 95 winners for 2026, in a competition that has recognized excellence in public relations globally since 1990. This year’s awards are presented in 49 categories, with agency and in-house entries judged separately. Regional works were also among the winners. Croatia won seven awards at this year’s edition, while Serbia recorded one recognition.
For Croatia, the awarded organizations are A1 Hrvatska, Millenium promocija, Integralni marketing i komunikacije, Abeceda komunikacije, CTA komunikacije and 404 agency. Serbia won its award thanks to the agency V+O Communication, for work in one of the most reputationally sensitive categories.
A1 Hrvatska won the award in the Business-to-business – Inhouse category for the project Repositioning A1 From Telco to Trusted ICT Partner. The focus was on repositioning the company from a classic telecom operator into a trusted ICT partner, which is one of the key communication topics for all telecoms that in recent years have been trying to move beyond the perception of infrastructure and enter the space of business transformation.
Healthcare brought Croatia as many as three awards. Abeceda komunikacije and Polyclinic Salvea were awarded for the campaign Love Is a Kiss, Not Food, which took the topic of childhood obesity out of the space of private parental discomfort and opened it up as a public health conversation. The campaign did not build its story on judgment, but on understanding a problem that is often recognized only when it has already become serious.
Millenium promocija won two awards. The first came in the Community relations – Agency category for the campaign Your Posture Is Your Future, carried out for Croatia Poliklinika. The topic of poor posture and spine health was turned into communication that stopped people in everyday spaces and reminded them that the consequences of a sedentary lifestyle do not begin only when pain appears.
The second award for Millenium promocija came in the Healthcare – Agency category for the campaign #SaveYourSkin, carried out for La Roche-Posay. The campaign addressed melanoma prevention and enabled citizens to receive free dermatological examinations, showing that healthcare communication has the greatest value when it does not remain only at the level of a message, but leads people to concrete action.
CTA komunikacije won the award in the Integration of traditional and new media – Agency category for the campaign Nature’s Most Beautiful Story, carried out for the natural spring water Cetina. At its center was the nature from which the brand comes, rather than a classic product narrative. The campaign connected traditional and new media around a story of the source, the landscape and the sound of nature, giving water a communication framework that rests not only on purity, but on origin.
In the Event management and live communication – Agency category, the project Harari in Zagreb: The Intellectual Event of 2025 was awarded, signed by Integralni marketing i komunikacije for Agency IMC. The arrival of Yuval Noah Harari in Zagreb was positioned as more than a guest appearance by a well-known author. It was an event that connected the regional audience with global conversations about artificial intelligence, democracy, truth and the future of society.
404 agency was awarded in the Public sector – Agency category for the project Constructive Journalism, carried out for the Croatian Agency for Media. At a time of declining trust in media and growing news fatigue, the project opened space for a different approach to journalism, one that does not stop at the problem, but looks for possible solutions and tools for more responsible public information.
Serbia is among the winners thanks to the agency V+O Communication, which was awarded in the Industrials – Agency category for the campaign From Controversy to Credibility, carried out for ZiJin Hotel Belgrade. It was a communication task in a particularly sensitive environment, where the company’s reputation, the industrial context and public perception carry the same weight as the business project itself.
This year’s regional results show that the best awarded PR campaigns no longer come only from the space of major consumer brands. They come from healthcare, public institutions, the B2B sector, industry, the culture of conversation and topics that directly affect people’s everyday lives. It is precisely there that public relations today most often show their real strength.
