Award Winners 2025-26

Best of Regional Advertising on Display at Awards Gala

The best of advertising was honored Thursday, Feb. 26, 2026, at the Western Virginia American Advertising Awards Gala in Roanoke. More than 175 attended the awards show at The Jefferson Center to celebrate creative excellence in the region. In addition to creative awards, AAF Roanoke awarded a Silver Medal to Gary Gilmore, Vice President of Brand (Firefli). The award is AAF’s lifetime achievement award.  

The annual awards competition received 127 professional entries from agencies, firms, in-house creatives, and individuals, as well as 99 student entries from Virginia Tech, Liberty University, James Madison University, and Radford University. 

Meaghan Dee took home the top professional honor of the year, the Howard Packett Award for Creative Excellence (AAF Roanoke’s Best in Show) for Nikki Giovanni Immersive Experience done for Virginia Tech, Office of the President. The campaign also won a Gold ADDY award and a Mosaic ADDY for the entry, which recognizes creative excellence showcasing diversity, equity, and inclusion. 

The Best of Digital/Electronic went to Carilion Clinic for They Took Care of Meg.

The Best of Print went to Branch for Branch GIRL Construction Experience.  

Additional Judge’s Choice awards went to Virginia Tech Dining Services for Tattoo Stories, Carrie Cousins LLC for New River Conservancy 50th Anniversary and ACK Studios for Vulpine Metalworks Visual Branding.

The American Advertising Awards is the advertising industry’s largest and most representative competition, attracting more than 25,000 entries every year in local competitions. AAF Roanoke’s Western Virginia American Advertising Awards competition is the first of a three-tier, national competition. Concurrently, across the country, local entrants vie to win ADDY Awards — recognition as the very best creative work in their markets. At the second tier, local ADDY winners compete against winners from other local clubs in one of 15 district competitions. District ADDY winners are then forwarded to the third tier, the national stage of the American Advertising Awards. Entry in the local competition is the first step toward winning a National ADDY. 

AAF Roanoke was also proud to award special awards to leaders in the advertising and marketing industry. The recipients have demonstrated outstanding contributions to the field of advertising and marketing in the past year, and AAF Roanoke congratulates them for the work they do.  

Advertising Person of the Year was awarded to Donna Wertalik, Professor of Practice, Director of Student Engagement at Virginia Tech and Founder of PRISM. Wertalik spearheaded the development and launch of the Pamplin Digital Twin Campus in 2024, a groundbreaking virtual reality initiative funded by an $80,000 donation she helped secure. This first-of-its-kind platform creates an interactive digital replica of the entire Pamplin College of Business and Virginia Tech’s Innovation Campus. 2025 marked PRISM’s 15th anniversary under Professor Wertalik’s leadership. PRISM includes 68 student members across multiple disciplines creating award-winning campaigns. As Director of Marketing Strategy and Analytics at Virginia Tech, her strategic initiatives resulted in a 35% increase in admissions through innovative marketing strategies, #2 national ranking for MIT program through targeted digital campaigns, $250 million Global Business and Analytics Complex successfully funded and opened and a 50% increase in Marketing Advisory Board funding.

Two young professionals were also recognized in the 2 Under 32 Awards. Carys DeRolf was recognized in the professional category and Milana Slowinski earned student recognition.


American Advertising Award Professional Winners

All gold awards will be submitted to AAF District 3 for further competition.

This year’s panel of judges included creatives from across the country: Erik Harty, Long Division Film (California); Sarah LaMendola, Brandtatorship (New York); and Ashly Mellor, Makers Ridge (Texas).

American Advertising Award Student Winners

The panel of student judges included: Erica Cundiff (Blue Honey Rose), David Hodge (Anstey Hodge Advertising Group) and Gabe Luna (WFXR TV).

All student gold and silver awards will be submitted to AAF District 3 for further competition. AAF Roanoke forwards silver awards for students at no additional charge.

Gary Gilmore Earns Silver Medal

The Silver Medal is AAF Roanoke’s lifetime achievement award. It recognizes those who have made outstanding contributions to advertising and who have been active in furthering the industry’s standards, creative excellence and responsibility in areas of social concern. The award serves to enhance the image of advertising by recognizing a locally well-known person for his or her advertising and community involvement. 

Gary Gilmore has been working in the local creative field professionally since 1997. His work experience in the advertising, design, marketing and web technology space. He was first employed with Kingma as a graphic designer from 1997 to 1998, then Katie Wallace Design as a graphic designer from 1998 to 2001. For the next 18 years, he worked at Access Advertising. Gary then went on to work as Vice President of Marketing at TMEIC in Salem, managing the marketing department for a worldwide organization. Gilmore now works at Firefli as Vice President of Brand.

Gilmore, in conjunction with many talented creative teams, have received more than a dozen awards for web design, graphic design and advertising on both a local and regional level, over many years. In addition to advertising awards, he was also awarded Ad Person of the Year by his peers in 1999 and Roanoke’s 30 Under 30 by the Blue Ridge Business Journal.

Gilmore has always looked for ways to pay it forward for the younger. For a number of years, he was an adjunct professor at Virginia Western Community College. Gilmore has also mentored many interns over the years at his various jobs.

Since 1997, Gilmore held many AAF board and committee positions on Ad2 Roanoke, AAF Roanoke, AAF District 3 regional board and AAF National. Through AAF, he has volunteered hundreds of hours for projects such as Create-a-Thon, the Media Auction, Resumé Review Day and Awards. He helped to create a diversity program for AAF District 3 and was often a speaker at various club and district-level meetings. He also served as a voice for Roanoke on the National ADDY committee. Gilmore has truly been an ambassador for the Roanoke advertising community.

As an awards show judge, Gilmore traveled across the country judging multiple student and professional advertising awards entries in the past two decades. He judged the student awards in Roanoke more than five times and judged professional advertising shows in the U.S. Virgin Islands, Arizona, Pennsylvania, Texas (twice), West Virginia, Nebraska, Minneapolis and California.

Gilmore has helped multiple nonprofit organizations with marketing and advertising solutions, such as CASA (Court Appointed Special Advocates), the Jefferson Center, The Music Lab and many others. He also gives thousands of dollars personally each year to the Boys & Girls Clubs of Southwest Virginia, the Southwest Virginia Wildlife Center and the Jimmy Fund, located in his home state of West Virginia. He also volunteers creative services to national nonprofits through Catchafire.com.

Huge thanks to this year’s event sponsors for helping make the awards gala possible: Associated Posters, Inc., Branch Group, Delta Dental of Virginia, Houck Advertising, Lamar, Pratt Industries, Martin’s Downtown, Red Velocity, and Starr Hill Pilot Brewery & Side Stage.

Congratulations to all of this year’s winners.