Shortlist best use of live-event marketing: ‘Essence of Authenticity’The Bocuse d’Or – also known as the ‘Concours mondial de la cuisine’ - is the biennial world cooking championship for the world’s leading chefs.Named after the world renowned chef Paul Bocuse, the event takes place near the end of January in Lyon, France at the SIRHA International Hotel, Catering and Food Trade Exhibition. It is one of the world’s most prestigious cooking competitions and frequently referred to as the culinary equivalent of the Olympic Games.The Nestlé Professional CHEF brand is one of the largest sponsors of the Bocuse d’Or event and in November 2012, tasked McCann Enterprise with developing a full communications strategy for this event, encompassing every aspect of the brand presence at the event from driving traffic to it; to designing the ‘stand’ itself; to building the menus & engaging the chefs; through to gifts; the programme itself; and follow up post-event.This was a prestigious honour as the chef community is notoriously closed to outside agencies or brands.Based on this brief, McCann Enterprise designed a communications and channel programme which drove awareness of the event amongst chefs; engaged the chefs during the event; educated customers about our product range; and followed up post-event.