Agency Spy

Leo Burnett Sydney has hired Andy DiLallo (pictured right) and Jay Benjamin (pictured left) from JWT as executive creative directors. They replace Mark Collis, who bailed out over to Ogilvy & Mather Japan.

More from Brand Republic Asia:

“After a five-month global talent search, the duo will complete the agency’s senior management line-up, following the recruitment of Scott Davis as head of strategy and Josh Grace as head of direct marketing.

Todd Sampson, chief executive of Leo Burnett Sydney, said: “I hired Andy and Jay because I think they are the best, and will lift an already high bar of creativity. This year, Leo Burnett will be one of the top creative agencies in the world.”

Mark Tutssel, Leo Burnett’s worldwide creative director, added: “Andy and Jay have a proven ability to generate big ideas time and time again. With Todd Sampson we now have a dynamic, new, creative management team in place, with the talent to take full advantage of the infinite creative opportunities that face our industry.”

I do like the STP ball cap — nice touch — very “hip, edgy & creative” — reminds me of a time that we interviewed a creative who showed up for a global client-facing role wearing green running shoes — odd choice…but they hired him and he lasted less than a year.

Anyway, last I heard LB Sydney is not doing too badly — especially when you measure it against the disasters of the Chicago & London offices — especially on the creative side of the business.  Good luck to the new kids!

Seems that Diageo has settled on JWT for the global Baileys advertising business worth about $80 million annually - as announced late yesterday out of London. They are in final negotiations on a contract at the moment.  The win is a boost for the WPP Group-owned agency after it lost the business to BBH five years ago.

Incumbent BBH and (surprise, surprise) Leo Burnett got turfed in the final round. Fallon was booted earlier in the process.  BBH will remain on the Diageo roster and will continue to work on Johnnie Walker. The loss will come as a blow to the agency, which lost the Smirnoff business to JWT in 2006

Agency Republic, an Omnicom agency, got assigned the global digital work earlier.

The current campaign shows Baileys aimed at moving it from being seen as a drink consumed only at Christmas.

OK…maybe it is not that bad — but the troubles at Leo Burnett UK continue on.

With today’s announcement of the departure of group marketing director Nina Jasinski (who lasted less than seven months) — she now adds to the total that tallies up to people such as the CEO, Executive Creative Director, Executive Planning Director, Head of Account Management, Head of Digital, Head of Research, Executive Creative Director at Arc (the below-the-line agency), several Client Service Directors, and numerous (in the area of dozens & dozens) of lower-level employees jetting off for greener pastures — all who have left in the past nine months — all described as “management restructures” — when described at all.

Jasinski was responsible for helping to win new business at the agency — which couldn’t have been too easy with the constant press mentions of all the employees looking to get the hell out (with the common phrase “leaving without a job to go to” often repeated ad nausuem in the press releases.)

Paired with a vast number of continuing & lingering account, creative & planning issues — well not a good cocktail for success in this game we call “advertising.”

It probably doesn’t help the fact that the relative new head of Leo Burnett UK, Andrew Edwards, has no significant “above the line” advertising experience, nor has he shown much (if any) success in his running of Arc Worldwide across the EMEA region for the past two years since his arrival from Australia.

He was inexplicably promoted this past October when, Bruce Haines, the past CEO of Leo Burnett UK Group (which included both Leo & Arc Worldwide) resigned in protest to the proposed decisions made by headquarters in Chicago over the future direction of the UK group.

There were jesting whispers around the building that Edwards must have compromising photos of Tom Bernardin, who is the chairman and CEO of Leo Burnett Worldwide in Chicago, to get the job — especially based off past performance since landing in London.

His sidekick on the “ad side”, Paul Lawson, Managing Director of Leo Burnett UK, is known in the building as a sexual harassment lawsuit waiting to happen — although he is referred to around the agency as “the classic 80’s ad man.” (aren’t code word phrases fun?)

They have shown quite the propensity to lose clients however in the building between the two entities — Nintendo, Fiat, Central Office of Information (COI), Monster, Beck’s, Post Office, etc — along with failing miserably on numerous high-profile pitches (Porsche, Fortis, etc.)

Not sure if the title even applies — don’t even need to turn the lights on if there is no reason to — and it looks like it is heading that way.

Leo Burnett, bastion of Publicis’ plan at being a hub in their plans for complete & total integration of all forms of media & advertising (in conjunction with Digitas & Starcom MediaVest Group — they have creatively dubbed it “The Insight Factory”) — and I assume targets global domination of said fields — seems to have an issue with the whole premise of the Web it seems.

Leo Burnett’s UK site — http://www.leoburnett.co.uk/ — is down & non-functional at the moment — for what i’m thinking is a completely basic & easily-fixed error. Shall we take bets on how long it will take to resolve & fix this?

Meet Rose Cameron, Leo Burnett Chicago’s senior vice president and planning director and um, Man Expert. Rose got the title after overseeing a global study of what men want in 2005. The report’s final word on the status quo of the male gender: “We appear to be witnessing a new experience of male insecurity and confusion.” Oh, we believe it. Rose is the go to gal for all things penises and gets in on strategy sessions for clients.

In her own words, “I just love men.” And really, who doesn’t? Cameron recently went to Hooters with The Chicago Tribune where she dissected the male psyche.

“She seizes the roll of paper towels that Hooters places at each table instead of napkins, and lowers her voice to a masculine rasp: “I’ve got these. I can be as dirty as I want to be, since my wife is always telling me I’m dirty.”

Seriously. We’re not male, but when we read the line above, even we got a little roiled up. We like Rose. Totally. We would so hang out with her. Yet, by the middle of the article something weird happens. The whole piece shifts wildly into her personal life and in a really weird way.

“Cameron is particularly interested in a man she knows as John, a promising online prospect from rural Washington state, who repairs tractors and sounds like a real cowboy hero.

“He’s just a delightful guy,” Cameron gushes, adding she had just sent him a die-cast model of a John Deere tractor, just to let him know she was thinking about him.”

And then, “- there is romantic promise in her voice this night as we leave the restaurant and head out into the parking lot. John could be something special, but Cameron says she’s going to stay guarded, at least for now. Her heart has been broken enough that she plans to proceed with caution.

It seems an unfortunate irony that Cameron, by day a leading authority on the male of the species, struggles to understand these mysterious creatures by night. As she discusses failed relationship after failed relationship, you can hear in her voice a real worry that her professional gift could also be her personal curse.

In many ways, Rose Cameron knows what men want, and she knows it’s not her.”

Oh my god! Shut up! Shut up! TMI! We’re sitting here wondering what the hell is going on here? The next few paragraphs deal with Rose’s difficulty with keeping a man. Who thought this was a good idea? Rose? The PR gal? Seriously. It almost undermines her own credibility. Yes, we can all give good advice to someone else and then, screw it up royally in our own personal lives, but heavens! TMI! TMI!

The article does swing back around to a promo piece for the agency full of findings from their study and professional accolades for Cameron. We were so relieved. They follow Cameron to a brainstorm for the new Pontiac G8. After Rose gives them two example commercials and chats with them about her four male segments: the traditional male, Archie Bunkers, metrosexuals and retrosexuals, etc.

“For the next five minutes the room continues to toss around ideas, and when the meeting wraps up, it does so with a buzz of energy and creativity. Two months later, the first ad featuring a glimpse of the G8 is finished. In the commercial, actor Matt Dillon raises the curtain with this line: “Coming this spring, the Pontiac G8 GT - the most powerful car under 30 Grand.”

You be the judge. Take a look at the spot above. Take off the advertising goggles for a second. Men - do you love it?

Oh! The end piece to this article in the Tribune magazine?

“Take John: Cameron finally concedes that relationship is going nowhere, despite her best research to figure out what makes him tick.

“Who knows, maybe he’s a 13-year-old boy or an old lady,” she says, staring out into the dark night, as the weather worsens.

“You just never know.”

Riiiiiight.

Leo Burnett let go of 30 staffers yesterdays. The agency is saying they are getting ready to plunge into yet another new organizational structure. The Chicago Tribune’s sources are saying that Josh Denberg and Paul Hirsch, (CDs who caome from Goodby in 2002) are getting the axe now that Washington Mutual is no longer with the shop.

That’s two of thirty. Not sure who else lost their desk. To all those who did, so sorry.

Bruce Haines resigned as chairman and chief executive of Leo Burnett London amid much brewhaha after what is was described as “a disagreement over the future structure of the UK group” in October.

It seems that loyal staffers are following him right out the door. The exact number departing the shop is unknown. Got more info? Have you left? AIM us (agencyspy) or use the anon tip box and we’ll post your comment.

Oooohh… we’re so excited for the holiday agency season! The parties! The bad entertainment and food! The creative director and the account manager finally getting it on in the coat room! Sigh…

We love party snaps and videos anyway, so please send us yours from the holiday git down.

We were also thinking of sending one of our spies in training about to cover the events. Our spy will interview guests, take pictures, eat everything in sight, probably get drunk and out us, too. That’s a risk we’re willing to take.

So, please… invite us! Email us at agencyspy at gmail com!

In the mean time, please enjoy some snaps of Leo Burnett’s holiday party last year. Um… it looks like it had a wedding theme, but why is the woman above dressed like a stripper? Does she work there? Confused. Little help?

Jason Oke, who has been the blogger of note over at the Leo Burnett blog, The Fruits Of The Imagination, is leaving his post at the agency as a VP of Strategic Planning. We’ve enjoyed his posting on the blog and we’re happy to see that Oke is now the Director of Strategic Planning at a new agency called Juniper Park. No details on the agency yet, but a hearty congrats to a fin, fine blogger.

In case you missed it, AdAge reported that six of GM’s eight brands were shifting strageties for how they handle their multicultural advertising. Cadillac and Hummer will go to GM’s current general market agency Modernista beginning Jan. 1. Meanwhile, Carol H. Williams Advertising will be losing GMC to Vigilante Advertising, which is a division of Leo Burnett. Vigilante already runs the Buick and Pontiac African-American accounts, as it too focuses on multi-cultural advertising. Williams’ California shop will also be defending Chevrolet’s African-American account.

This week, the ever vigilant ad blog MultiCultClassics is running a series of ads “commemorating General Motors’ decision to dump minority agencies and give the multicultural assignments to its general market (i.e., White) agencies.” The first in this daily series is above. See it big here. We’re not sure why they’re running this series, as it sounds like GM is doing what every other brand is doing these days - consolidating the work Plus, Vigilante is a multicultural agency, so what’s the problem? Maybe we’re missing something… little help?

Meanwhile, AccentMarketing will lose Pontiac and GMC accounts to Lapiz, a Burnett sibling focusing on the Hispanic marketplace. AccentMarketing will keep GM’s corporate Hispanic account, as well as Cadillac, Hummer and Chevrolet. Both Saturn and Saab use the general market agencies for all of their work. Deutsch, Los Angeles, handles Saturn, while death star big brother McCann, will pick up Saab.

The only problem we see with these shifts is that Saab is going to McCann, which, you know… we’re always baffled that someone willingly signs up with McCann.

UPDATE: HighJive from MultiCultClassics explains his thinking:

as always, thanks for the shout out.

but you need to look more closely at the ad age article. vigilante is LOSING its business to leo burnett. one would think that GM would keep its work with vigilante, as it’s tied to burnett, but the decision is to dump the minority shop too.

it’s a consolidation that appears to be drawn along multicultural lines. on the one hand, given GM’s continuing death spiral, it’s all inevitable. but it’s pretty gutsy from a pr standpoint to ax the minorities. especially when the ad industry has failed to demonstrate diversity in the general market ranks. anyone who’s worked in minority agencies knows the advertisers give lousy budgets to the minorities to begin with—but at the same time, the big car companies are one of the few dedicated sources of revenue for minority shops. wonder how long before jesse jackson and al sharpton speak up.

later