Clio Awards
award for creative excellence in advertising and design
The Clio Awards, or simply The Clios, is an annual award in advertising that recognizes creative excellence and innovation in communication and design, judged by advertising professionals from around the world. The awards are presented by Evolution Media.
The Clios has several awards programs alongside the larger Clio Awards that recognize creative marketing efforts in specific industries: Clio Cannabis, Clio Entertainment, Clio Fashion & Beauty, Clio Health, Clio Music, and Clio Sports. Each media type has the opportunity to award the Grand Clio, the highest honor.
In 1991, the event was described as the most recognizable international advertising award by Time, the "Oscars" of advertising.
History
The awards, founded by Wallace A. Ross in 1959, are named for the Greek goddess Clio, the mythological Muse known as "the proclaimer, glorifier and celebrator of history, great deeds and accomplishments."
Originally presented by the American Radio and TV Commercials Festival, the parent company for the Clios, also founded and directed by Ross, the first Clios were awarded in 1960 for excellence in U.S. television advertising. Each winner received a gold Georg Olden–designed statuette. The competition was expanded to include work on international television and cinema in 1966, and then U.S. radio ads in 1967.
1970s–1980s
The Clio Awards were acquired by Bill Evans in 1971 for US$150,000 (equivalent to $1,154,535 in 2025) and became a "for profit" company. Over the next two decades, the company's income grew to $2.5 million per year, derived primarily from Clio nomination fees, of $70 to $100 per entry.
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This entry incorporates text from “Clio Awards” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.