For marketing in general and event marketing in particular, the rules of the game, not to mention management’s demands, have changed. Yesterday’s multi-million-dollar whiz-bang bash — with pyrotechnics, gyrating acrobats, and nothing to show for it but a floor full of confetti and “everybody loved it” results — doesn’t cut it when budgets are under major scrutiny and executives are chanting “measurement, results, and ROI, or bust.” Granted, smart marketers did away with marketing “parties” a long time ago. But in today’s economy, more than ever, the party is truly over, and event marketers must deliver not only clever concepts that cut through the clutter, but also strategic events that generate hard-core results for the bottom line.

The winners of the 2008 Corporate EVENT Awards got it right on both accounts. Hailed by judges as “unprecedented” and “radically relevant,” the winners of the fifth annual competition devised customer-centric concepts that also banged out measurable bottom-line benefits.

Please join us, then, in congratulating the 2008 Corporate EVENT Award winners — a savvy group of events that not only scored big despite the new rules of the game, they moved way beyond parties and into the realm of results-conscious experiences.

The Winners:

Big Cat on Campus To claw its way into cat owners' hearts and minds, Del Monte Foods opens the celebrity-studded Meow Mix Acatemy to celebrate cat ownership and school consumers on how tp think like a cat.

Going Keen Bag and footwear manufacturer Keen Inc. recruits volunteer student ambassadors to bring its message of sustainability to 46 college campuses across the country, putting its brand before more than 1 million students in the process.

Surreality TV In the midst of Spain's busiest selling season, Electrolux Home Products España S.A. attracts hundreds of busy Spanish retail buyers to a product-launch event by playing off the country's passion for variety shows.

The 60-Minute Brand Lunch U.K.-based health and beauty retailer Boots Retail USA Inc. brings five of its brands stateside with an hour-long product-launch event, attracting 93 percent of invitees and generating mega media presence in 20 targeted media outlets.

Multi-Sensory Marketing To turn a minor vehicle upgrade into major news, Renault España Comercial S.A. impresses jaded journalists with a launch that markets to all five senses.