Hasta La Creative!

Marketers’ optimism regarding companies’ financial prospects are at their lowest level for four-and-a-half years, despite UK marketing budgets being expanded, compared to three months ago.

New York-based energy giant Consolidated Edison, better known as Con Ed or the company you only call when your power goes out, has named Havas New York as its new agency of record after a competitive review led by Joanne Davis Consulting.

The Gate had been creative AOR for the client.

In proper Havas fashion, the network won both creative and media duties for the company, which serves most residents of New York City and the surrounding area including Westchester, Orange and Rockland counties.

WPP’s Possible, which has been lead digital agency on Con Ed, was not involved in the review and will retain that portion of the business. The announcement also coincidentally arrives on the same day that Con Ed plans to roll out a new website and app designed by Possible.

“We look forward to a new partnership with Havas in serving our customers,” said Con Ed SVP of corporate affairs Frances A. Resheske. “Havas impressed us with their powerful data-fueled creative approach from the very start, not only through their understanding of the Con Edison brand, but how that manifests itself in our customers’ everyday relationship with their energy.”

Recently promoted Havas N.Y. CEO Laura Maness added, “It is our privilege to partner with Con Edison. We believe strongly that the brand should be seen as a critical and celebrated part of New York culture. Con Edison is not just a utility in the city, but an icon of the city that connects us all.”

Con Ed is a privately owned company that functions like a public utility. While it maintains a near-monopoly over the New York-area power grid, it is still a regional business with a relatively modest $6 million marketing budget in 2016, according to Kantar Media. Con Ed spent around $7 million the previous year.

Still, this marks a much-needed win for Havas, which lost one of its legacy clients when Heineken officially moved Dos Equis to Droga5 without a review last month. Moving forward, the new shop’s primary assignment will involve an early 2018 campaign focusing on sustainability efforts and new tools designed to help customers use energy more efficiently.

Venables Bell & Partners (VB+P) strengthened the leadership team for its experience design practice, VBP Orange.

Brian Diecks (pictured, left) joins VBP Orange as director of client services and production, while Peter Antonelli (pictured, right) will serve as design director. Along with VBP Orange founder and director of strategy Harlan Kennedy, the pair round out the experience design practice’s leadership team.

“Often in this industry, marketers and agencies focus narrowly on building their brand solely through mass communications. Our charge at Orange is to ensure the brand’s DNA and promise is reflected clearly in more tangible experiences with the brand, particularly in their physical spaces and retail environments – and that those experiences deliver on the brand’s objectives overall,” Kennedy said in a statement. “Both Brian and Peter bring a compelling skill set and each have a unique passion for what we do. I’m thrilled to welcome them to our team as we continue to find innovative ways to enhance consumers’ experiences with our brand partners.”

Diecks will be tasked with leading all client relationships and project execution. He joins the agency from Swirl, where he spent over five and a half years leading creative on the agency’s Sprint and Microsoft retail accounts as creative director. Prior to joining Swirl, he served as vice president, creative services at Premier Retail Networks (PRN) for four years, working with clients such as Walmart, Target, Best Buy, Costco, Sam’s Club and Meijer.

As design director, Antonelli will be responsible for providing leadership in “ideation, design, and definition of human–centered brand experiences.” Antonelli joins VBP Orange from global design and innovation firm IDEO, where he has served as design director for its New York office since March of 2016, following four years as senior design lead and nearly the same period as senior communications designer before that. Antonelli founded independent design practice Antonelli Design in 2001 and has taught at The New School and NYU.

Havas Chicago hired Karen Goodman as group creative director.

In the role, she will be tasked with leading creative on the agency’s Hefty and Reynold’s accounts while reporting to Havas Chicago executive creative director Paul Hirsch.

“The range of experience Karen brings to Havas is invaluable,” Hirsch said in a statement. “We’re building a shop infused with heart and soul and culture. There’s so much opportunity to create and Karen has the chops to run with it.”

“Karen is one of the most elite creative women in the industry. She’s a triple threat, bringing to Havas client and agency experience, exceptional creative thinking and an awesome attitude,” Jason Peterson, who has served as Havas Chicago’s CCO since December of 2012 and was recently named co-chair of Havas’ U.S. Creative division, added. “What is most exciting about her is that she’s a non-traditional thinker – a true maker who fits into my belief that all creatives should be and can be true creators.”

Goodman joins Havas from Under Armour, where she has served as a creative and content director for the brand’s global concepts and strategy division since April of 2015. With Under Armour she worked on digital campaigns featuring athletes such as Misty Copeland, Stephen Curry and Jordan Spieth.

Prior to joining Under Armour, Goodman spent five months as an associate creative director for Pappas Group, following a similarly short stint as a freelance creative. Before that she spent around two and a half years as a senior creative with Johannes Leonardo, working with brands including Nike, Bacardi, Google, YouTube, Diet Coke and Sprite, as well as on new business. That followed three years as an art director with R/GA New York, where she worked with Google, Nike, Walmart and on new business.

A 2008 Future Lions award winner, she held the “world’s most expensive bake sale,” selling cookies for $500 each in order to finance a trip to pick up the award in person. She’s also the founder and director of the D.C. chapter of women’s global networking organization SheSays.

W+K London worked with production company Time Based Arts to craft an animated celebration of “Dream Makers” for Honda U.K. which marks the directorial debut of James Allen and Mike Skrgatic.

The spot features four characters, who each drive a different model of Honda in their respective stories. Each of them races toward the conclusion of a plot that is already in progress. Interestingly, various stages of the process behind the creation of each segment is shown in detail, while the action unfolds.

The process, as it turns out, is at least as important as the individual stories themselves. It’s at the heart of the message celebrating the “Dream Makers” behind bringing such ideas to life, from script to finished product, implicitly likening them to the minds behind the Honda vehicles shown.

“The best Honda ads often overcome some kind of challenge in the craft and the storytelling that reflects the ingenuity of the brand. There’s crazy technology involved in making a film or a Honda nowadays, but it’s ultimately the warmth of the human touch that makes them achieve excellence,” W+K London creative directors Carlos Alija and Laura Sampedro explained in a statement published by LBB.

Shorter spots, presumably individual scenes from the full version, will run on films shown on Channel 4, More4, Film4 and E4 for a full year, with a longer version living on as cinema ad and online.

The campaign follows a similarly high concept campaign from a competitor here in the U.S. last month. Saatchi & Saatchi L.A. launched a series of short films for Toyota which each played with the concept of time.

Credits:

Creative Agency: Wieden+Kennedy London
Creative Directors: Carlos Alija, Laura Sampedro
Creatives: Carlos Alija, Laura Sampedro, Juan Sevilla, Mico Toledo
Executive Creative Directors: Tony Davidson, Iain Tait, Kim Papworth
Producer: Michelle Brough
Executive Producer: James Guy
Account Manager: Olivia Amato-Pace
Account Director: James McHoull
Group Account Director: Nick Owen

Production Company: Time Based Arts
Directors: James Allen, Mike Skrgatic
DOP: Daniel Landin
Producer: Bonnie Anthony

Post-Production Company: Time Based Arts
3D: Chris Wood, Dan Davie, Tom Robinson, Stephen Ross
Executive Producer: Tom Johnson
Colourist: Simone Gratarolla
Concept Artists: Sylvie Minois, James Husbands, Yibi Hu, Nigel Raynor, Ben Oliver
3D Artists: Federico Guzzardo, James Mann, Oscar Gonzalez Diez, Dave LohMike Battcock, Sam Osbourne, Federico Vanone, Nigel Timms, Jeroen Hooghoudt, Tom Hall, Jess Gorick
Nuke Artist: Ralph Briscoe, Aitor Arroyo, Linda Cieniawska
Nuke: Matt Shires, Bernie Varela (Lead)
Flame Artists: Jamie Crofts, Adam Paterson
Flame: Luke Todd, Matt Jackson, Thiago Dantas (Lead)
VFX Supervisor: Sheldon Gardner, Stephen Grasso

Bullish, the New York-based “most dangerous agency” launched by Deutsch veterans Michael Duda and Brent Vartan nearly two years ago, always told the press that they were a combination ad agency and investment firm.

We were a little skeptical … but it’s a real thing. (Hence the name, get it?)

A week ago, AdAge reported that Bullish had ended its relationship with GNC after a messy Super Bowl spat with Fox Sports in order to invest an estimated quarter of a million bucks in Care/of, a subscription-only vitamin supplement service.

Now the company has made public its second investment—this one in Function of Beauty, a company that makes personalized shampoos.

Yes, that’s right. The brand’s own self-description reads, “We use proprietary algorithms, developed by MIT engineers, to produce personalized hair care products tailored to your unique hair profile and hair goals.”

Bullish celebrated the announcement with a classic banner ad. $5 off your first order!

.@bebullish‘s newest brand investment/building opportunity. @fxofbeauty has over 12,000,000,000 shampoo/conditioner combinations. #$ #! pic.twitter.com/2fwd3i4xbt

— Michael Duda (@MikeDuda) July 18, 2017

Duda told us today that the investment is in “the low six digits” as with Care/of.

Business Insider reviewed the Function of Beauty customer experience earlier this month, calling it “fun, if not exactly life-altering.” Perhaps more importantly, Cindy Gallop is a fan.