The Shipyard, a San Diego advertising agency, and the San Diego Tourism Authority (SDTA) were among the top winners at the recent 2026 Sandie Awards presented by the American Marketing Association (AMA), San Diego chapter.
The Shipyard received five awards, including three Golds for work on behalf of the San Diego Zoo Wildlife Alliance, plus a Silver in the video category and a Bronze in the experiential category. The categories for The Shipyard’s three Gold awards included integrated campaign, influencer campaign and video for its “Join the Herd” TV commercial.
SDTA also received five awards, including Best of Show, a Gold for public relations, a Silver for website design and two Bronze for event marketing and the experiential categories, which was shared with The Shipyard. The Best of Show and Gold awards were for “Game On: Capturing Mexico’s Sports Tourism.”
SDTA’s “Game On” campaign was recognized for its strategic vision, cross-border storytelling and measurable impact in positioning San Diego as a premier sports tourism destination, AMA said.
Winners of three awards apiece included the San Diego Foundation; Red Door Interactive; the San Diego International Airport; Compass Digital and Mixte Communications.
Winners of two awards included Petrucci Marketing; the San Diego Foundation; SeaWorld San Diego; InnoVision Marketing Group; Digitopia; cThru Media, Hyphn, Clearpoint Agency and the University of San Diego Arts & Sciences.
Single award winners included Mission Fed Credit Union; Movetic; San Diego Community Power; Carlsbad Educational Foundation; Jacobs & Cushman San Diego Food Bank; Enlyte; J Walcher Communications; Loma Media; SolarTech Energy Systems; Ooly; Manscaped and Darlington Marketing Company.
In the student category, Point Loma Nazarene University led with 10 Sandies, the University of San Diego followed with six awards and San Diego State University and Cal State San Marcos each won one award.
The AMA chapter’s fourth annual Sandie Awards program, held May 21 at the Town and Country Resort Hotel and attended by about 250 people, also include several special awards.
Karen Devlin, VP of AI and SEO at Ignite Visibility, was honored as Trailblazer of the Year for her exceptional foresight, innovative methodology, and measurable impact on both clients and the broader marketing community.
AMA said Devlin has transformed the way businesses approach search by anticipating the profound impact of generative AI on SEO and creating actionable strategies that set new industry standards. She has pioneered a first-to-market approach to AI SEO, shifting the focus from keyword-driven tactics to a holistic model emphasizing retrievability, authority and competitive differentiation.
Agency of the Year honors went to Kanbar Digital, led by President and CEO Khalil Kanbar.
The AMA said Kanbar Digital has grown over three years from $1 million to $2.5 million in annual revenue while tripling its team to 15 full-time employees. Fortune Magazine featured Kanbar Digital as an agency that helps brands navigate the age of AI. Kanbar’s work spans SEO, paid media, Amazon, social, email and emerging channels, including CTV and AI visibility optimization, AMA said.
Theresa Nakata, VP and chief marketing and communications officer at San Diego Foundation, was named Marketer of the Year in recognition of her leadership, strategic vision and the meaningful impact of her work advancing the Foundation’s mission.
According to the AMA, the San Diego Foundation’s marketing and communications team executed two distinctly different campaigns in 2025, including one that was developed over several years and another launched in just a matter of weeks in response to urgent community need.
“Being named Marketer of the Year is an honor, and especially meaningful as this nomination came from my team,” Nakata told Times of San Diego. “Every day, I’m inspired by our team, donors and nonprofit partners at San Diego Foundation, and I’m grateful to improve the quality of life for those furthest from opportunity in San Diego County.”
Judges for the event included 30 nationwide marketing professionals from outside San Diego and Orange County.
“Our judges had a difficult job this year, and the depth of talent across every category made for some of the closest scoring we’ve ever seen,” said Summer Haines, Sandies chair and an AMA San Diego board member. “I’m especially proud of this year’s special honorees on their well-deserved recognitions.”
Officials said 76 awards were presented from among a record-high 154 entries submitted by 55 companies or agencies and four collegiate institutions for work produced for or by San Diego-based organizations in 2025.
The 14 categories included branding, digital marketing, public relations, video, social media, experiential, integrated campaigns and DEI (diversity, equity, inclusion).
A list of award winners can be viewed at the Sandie Awards website.
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Students produce TV PSAR for mental health healing
The Bridge Lab Foundation, a San Diego nonprofit focusing on youth wellness, mental health and community leadership, reports eight high school students enrolled in its Frontline program recently produced a 30-second, pubic service announcement (PSA) TV commercial promoting the Frontline Community Wellness Fair to be held Saturday, June 13, at the City Heights PANA Center, 5577 University Ave., San Diego.
Kristin Calabria, who founded the Bridge Lab Foundation in 2018, told Times of San Diego that Cox Communications is planning to air the PSA more than 1,000 times on all its cable TV channels starting May 18.
“The students, ages 14 to 17, started working on writing in March and April, and the spot was filmed at the end of April,” Calabria said. “They worked together to write, storyboard, direct and produce messaging grounded in their lived experiences with stigma, intergenerational trauma, academic pressure, isolation and the challenges to navigating mental health in today’s world. The PSA focused on the growing mental health crisis facing young people and the urgent need for community-centered healing spaces.”
The students included: Carolyn Smith, La Jolla High School; Yuki and Zach Wu, Canyon Crest Academy; Kobchok Suadprathon, O’Farrell Charter School; Alfonse Jaimes, Hoover High School; Hazel Ching, San Diego Met High School at San Diego Mesa College; Olivia Davis, Monte Vista High School; and, Quynh Anh Nguyen, Mira Mesa High School.
“Guided by Frontline facilitators, the youth used storytelling as a form of advocacy and healing, centering authentic youth voice at every stage of production,” said Calabria, a practicing licensed marriage and family therapist with an office in Clairemont.
A statement said the Community Wellness Fair is designed to create a non-hierarchical, culturally-responsive space where youth, families, educators and community members can engage openly in conversations about mental health, stigma and intergenerational healing.”
Calabria said Bridge Lab’s programs include a year-long mental health mentorship and leadership program designed to engage in mental health through decolonized healing practices.
“Our goal is to end systemic oppression in education through the lens of mental health among marginalized and disadvantaged youths who have been hurt by the system of weaponization and adverse childhood experiences, including trauma and depression,” Calabria said.
Calabria said funders to Bridge Lab include San Diego Foundation, Thomas C. Ackerman Foundation, Deveraux Family Foundation, Aerie Real Foundation and Mission Beach Women’s Club.
PANA is an acronym for Partnership for the Advancement of New Americans, an organization that provides services to migrants and asylum seekers. It recently announced plans to build a $155 million campus by 2030 on 2.2 acres near Chollas Parkway and University Avenue, near the proposed Chollas Triangle Neighborhood Park.
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The silencing of CBS News Radio after nearly a century
After 99 years of broadcasting, CBS News Radio ceased operations on May 22. It was a stunning move that brought an end to one of America’s most recognizable sources of news reporting.
Over the decades, CBS radio became a cornerstone in the creation of broadcast journalism, particularly with Edward R. Murrow’s on-the-ground reporting from London during the blitz in World War II.
Until the end, CBS News Radio provided top-of-the-hour newscasts (three-to-four minutes in length) to an estimated 700 radio stations across the country, including its daily “World News Roundup” program, which had been on the air since 1938.
Also airing by CBS News Radio were one-minute headline newscasts carried at the bottom of each hour, special reports and breaking news feeds as they happen. Newscasts were recognized by millions of listeners for the “bing” and jingle sounder that marked the beginning of news broadcast.
For many smaller-market stations, most of which have no local newsrooms, the network served as an affordable way to deliver credible national news. Without it, stations have found alternative options.
Today, many of those 700 affiliates are airing newscasts from other audio news services. And, there are many to choose from, according to San Diego’s Cliff Albert, news director, KOGO News Radio 600-AM.
The choices include Bloomberg, The Wall Street Journal, iHeartRadio 24/7 News, Salem Broadcasting, Fox News, ABC, Westwood One and USA Radio News.
Richard Wagoner, Orange County Register media columnist, noted that KNX 1070-AM in Los Angeles switched to ABC for its hourly news updates. KCBS 740-AM in San Francisco also is airing ABC News. “Who would have guessed that would ever happen?” Wagoner wrote.
Still, the shutdown of CBS News Radio sent shockwaves through the radio industry and sad reactions from a community of journalists, staffers and news consumers.
Former Associated Press national media writer David Bauder quoted retired CBS News anchor Dan Rather, now 94: “It’s another piece of America that is gone.”
Longtime San Diego radio personality Mark Larson posted on social media: “World News Roundup provided the world with essential coverage of World War II and beyond. Yes, listening habits are different now and the Internet has endless other sources, but this is a tough decision to understand. Corporations can do what they need to do, of course, but this is painful.”
News anchor Phil Farrar, who works with Larson at KOGO, said, “After 99 years an American heartbeat has left us. CBS News Radio has signed off. CBS was always ready around the world to bring you the latest and nobody did it better when it mattered. But, it is no longer CBS. The owners are Paramount and Skydance Media. With all of this advanced technology the new owners felt there is no need for a constant source of believable news that didn’t lean left or right.”
Industry analysts have noted the CBS News Radio shutdown is signaling CBS’ pivot to digital platforms as it prepares to merge with CNN under Paramount’s proposed acquisition of Warner Bros. Discovery.
Many have pointed to new CBS News Editor-in-Chief Bari Weiss to blame for the network’s demise, despite CBS radio reaching 20 million listeners weekly.
However, others have cited a convergence of economic pressure, corporate short-sightedness and an industry-wide failure of imagination, including Garrett Searight, broadcasting industry columnist with Barrett Media. “The real culprits are far more systemic,” said Searight.
Bob Lawrence, another columnist with Barrett Media, said, “Today’s consumers get their news on demand. Let’s face it, most people get their news before ever turning on any audio source. Digital news platforms hijack our listeners every day. Delivering information on smart devices as soon as their eyes open. As a result, this shift has fragmented the once-massive audiences that networks relied on to sustain advertising revenue.”
“While this was a necessary decision, it was not an easy one,” the company said to employees in a widely–reported memo from Weiss and CBS News President Tom Cibrowski. “It’s no secret that the news business is changing radically, and that we need to change along with it. A shift in radio station programming strategies, coupled with challenging economic realities, has made it impossible to continue the service.”
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