Hasta La Creative!

MDC Partners has acquired Swedish agency Forsman & Bodenfors, which will in turn form a “strategic global partnership” with CP+B.

At least we assume that’s the news. The press release does not include the word “acquisition” and mentions nothing about what portion of the agency MDC will own. It does, however, note the newly empowered network’s plan to unleash “an arsenal of extraordinary creative talent” by giving CP+B access to international staffers.

F&B is, of course, best known for the 2013 “Epic Split” campaign for Volvo Trucks starring Jean-Claude Van Damme. This past December Volvo designated Forsman & Bodenfors as its global strategic creative agency, and recent work for the client includes the “Prologue” launch spot for its “Made in Sweden” campaign, arriving ahead of the UEFA Euro 2016 tournament and starring Sweden national team captain Zlatan Ibrahimovic. Last September, the agency also teamed up with Iggy Pop in a spot for  H&M called “Close the Loop.”

Since its 1986 inception, the agency has grown to a team of 300, led by CEO Erik Sollenberg and chairman Anna Qvennerstedt. 

“I love Forsman & Bodenfors,” said CP+B chairman Chuck Porter, in a statement. “They only care about great work, and we share so much DNA they’re like our twin who grew up in Sweden. This business always needs re-invention and I think amazing things will come out of this partnership.”

“What we are creating is a fresh, seamless way to tap into the most potent collection of creative talent in the world,” added CP+B global CEO Lori Senecal. “At CP+B we’re building a modern global model that challenges the conventions of legacy agencies.  What ultimately makes us most valuable to global marketers is creating the boldest most inventive ideas that deliver the highest return on creativity, and this partnership amplifies our mission to do that more consistently and brilliantly than ever before.”

New York–based GlobalHue, which has been named the industry’s top African-American agency by AdAge multiple times and designated “Multicultural Agency of the Decade” by Adweek in 2009, has failed to pay its employees’ salaries for more than three months.

Yesterday, founder, chairman and CEO Don Coleman conceded in an email that the agency has been unable to compensate its remaining staffers since March 15 and that their health care benefits expired on April 31. He attributed this extended to delay to an unspecified financial issue, writing, “We have over a million dollars that has been held up by my bank over a dispute.”

Coleman, who launched the agency in Southfield, Michigan in 1988, wrote, “This is the first time in 28 years we’ve had this problem. There are a number of reasons why.” He then stated that the issue would be resolved “this week.” When asked to clarify, Coleman specifically claimed that all parties currently owed money by GlobalHue will be paid, including any outside vendors and former employees.

In response to a question regarding sources’ claims that GlobalHue will be closing one or both of its offices, Coleman wrote, “No office is closing.” On Monday, however, we spoke to the director of business development at a company called Motor City Computer who said that his company had recently been hired to clear GlobalHue’s Detroit-area location of all computers and related electronics in addition to wiping their hard drives. He told us that his company completed the work for which it was contracted but that it has not been paid by the agency despite repeated queries.Todd Palmer told us that he had begun to post comments on the agency’s Facebook page after he did not receive any response to repeated emails and voicemails.

The agency has worked with clients like Verizon, MGM Grand Detroit and the Bermuda Department of Tourism. Its best-known work in recent years was a 2014 campaign for Jeep starring Bob Dylan that first aired during Super Bowl XLVIII, and an article that appeared Crain’s Detroit Business the following week called the campaign “a step to general accounts.”

In March 2015, a FIAT Chrysler spokesperson confirmed that the company had parted ways with the shop, which had been creative AOR on the Jeep brand for more than five years. That statement came several days after an agency spokesperson confirmed that the organization would move its headquarters from Southfield to Manhattan with the Detroit-area location serving as “a smaller satellite office.” Former EVP/chief creative officer and DDB Chicago veteran Vida Cornelious then went to Walton Isaacson, and Chrysler eventually sent the Jeep business to DDB Chicago after telling us that it did not plan to name a new agency of record for the brand.

GlobalHue’s LinkedIn page currently lists its total employee count as 200-500, but multiple sources have independently told us that the number of staffers remaining in New York is approximately 15-20. We also hear, again from individuals who reached out to us individually rather than using the anonymous tip box, that employees have been told not to come into the office. Two sources claim that the only recent exception to that rule involved a day on which team members were told to be present when a Walmart representative visited the New York office.

Regarding Coleman’s note about a banking dispute, a former freelance creative director tells us that the CEO has been making similar statements to current and former employees since January. This CD claims that he began working for the agency last October but has not been paid for his work since March, and he also says that agency representatives no longer respond to any related queries after initially making multiple reassurances that he would eventually be paid. Today he forwarded us an automatic out of office auto reply that he received on May 18 from former director of finance Christopher Christie. It read, “I no longer work at GlobalHue. Please direct all HR, payroll and benefit questions to [other executives].”

GlobalHue has also recently experienced some changes in its client lineup. In May, a spokesperson for U.S. Bank confirmed that the company had ended its relationship with the organization, which had been its multicultural AOR in late 2013.

“I am very appreciative of my employees who have remained loyal to the agency during this time of disruption,” Coleman wrote yesterday. “And we will be back to normal very soon.”

Last Friday, we wrote about Florida Lottery appointing Tampa-based agency PP+K as its general market agency of record following a review. We noted that a spokeswoman for the Florida Lottery declined to comment to Florida Politics prior to a “safe-harbor period” ending some time on Friday, which coincided with the deadline for losing bidders in the review to file an administrative protest over the decision. Now SaintPetersBlog reports that incumbent agency St. John & Partners has filed a 166-page bid protest.

St. John & Partners had held the account since 2009. Following the review which resulted in St. John & Partners winning the account, Zimmerman Advertising lodged a protest of its own, which held up the award for several weeks.

According to SaintPetersBlog, among the allegations in the bid protest are that Tallahassee consultant David Bishop failed to observe a law regarding a two-year ban on former agency officials lobbying their former employers. The bid protest claims Bishop, a former deputy secretary of the Florida Lottery, lobbied on behalf of PP+K just 15 months after leaving his former position. PP+K maintains that Bishop “never met with any Lottery official privately” and never otherwise “actively lobbied” on PP+K’s behalf. Other allegations include that Florida Lottery broke the state’s Sunshine Law by failing to provide a public hearing discussing “the relative merits of the vendors and arrive at a best value determination and award recommendation,” and that they also never requested a “best and final offer” from participating agencies.

In the bid protest, St. John & Partners asks that Florida Lottery suspends awarding the contract to PP+K, until the decision is resolved either by the court or “final agency action,” either scrapping the award and relaunching the review or awarding it to the incumbent.

An Almap BBDO Brazil outdoor ad for Bayer aspirin has stirred some controversy after being awarded a Bronze Lion at the 2016 Cannes International Festival of Creativity in the Outdoor category.

The ad in question seemingly makes joking reference to non-consensual filming of a sexual act. It depicts two boxes of aspirin with the text:”‘Don’t Worry Babe, I’m Not Filming This’.Mov” — the assumption being that it alludes to a video file. Yikes.

That such an ad would be approved in this first place is bad enough. That a jury at Cannes decided it deserved an award is truly an embarrassment. Attention is being brought to the ad, and the jury which awarded it, thanks to Cindy Gallop tweeting about it, as you can see below.

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In a follow-up tweet, Gallop added, “Don’t use this to sell aspirin, male-dominated ad industry, & don’t award it, male-dominated juries. #canneslions.”

Predictably, those who saw Gallop’s tweets reacted with disgust at the ad, as well as a mix of exasperation and disbelief that a Cannes jury decided it merited awards recognition. Of course this isn’t the first embarrassing incident involving sexism at the festival this year. Just yesterday, VaynerMedia and Thrillist received a fair share of criticism for a party invite intended for “attractive females and models only” which the agency attributed to third party events company iGetIn.

An email invitation for a party hosted by VaynerMedia and Thrillist Media Group, featuring a performance by Wyclef Jean caused a swift backlash, thanks to the line “Please be aware that this specific list is for attractive females and models only.” It went on to request that “Ladies” seeking admittance to the party send “recent untouched photos and/or your Instagram/Facebook links for you and each of your additional female guest [sic],” adding, “once we have reviewed we will send you specific entry details.” Men, meanwhile were advised to “contact the PR departments of the respective sponsors” to request admittance. 

A female ad executive told Adweek that she and two colleagues received the email yesterday. One of them then forwarded the email to industry veteran and women’s advocate Cindy Gallop, who shared the email on Twitter and wrote, “It’s 2016, @vaynermedia @thrillist. This is not how you party at @cannes_lions.”

The email was sent by an events company called iGetIn. One of the women who received the email called the number listed and was told the sexist requests were a “totally normal practice.” Sounds pretty sketchy.

Gary Vaynerchuck seemed genuinely shocked to learn of its nature and quickly responded with a video apology. In it, he claimed he was “mortified” by the email, but accepted responsibility as VaynerMedia CEO. Vaynerchuck also reached out to apologize to the executive who forwarded the email to Gallop.

A Thrillist spokesperson, meanwhile, wrote, “A third party promotions company sent this email without us knowing. We apologize to anyone who was spammed with this but it didn’t come from Thrillist or Vayner. The guest list for the party has been closed for some time and will not include anyone who replies to that email.”

A VaynerMedia spokesperson told Adweek that the agency was not directly involved in the hiring of iGetIn and that “the message  itself was not reflective of the company or its culture.” Adweek reached out iGetIn but has yet to receive a response. 

During yesterday’s sentencing hearing for convicted felon Bill Grizack in North Carolina, the president/partner of The Variable read a statement calling him a “con man…addicted to lying,” contradicting the defense team’s attempts to portray him as a respectable family man who had simply taken a wrong turn in a legitimate attempt to further his own career.

Like the state prosecutor, Keith Vest urged the judge in the case to give Grizack a longer sentence. After we left the courtroom, Vest promised to provide an official statement on behalf of the agency, and he did so yesterday evening.

That statement in full:

As mentioned this morning, here is a follow-up statement to what was shared in the courtroom:

Bill Grizack caused employees to lose their jobs; he caused unimaginable emotional turmoil and he almost destroyed a company whose only fault was an instinct to trust.

For the past three years, we have worked closely with the authorities so that no other company falls victim to Grizack’s duplicity. Since 2013, The Variable has thrived – more than quadrupling agency revenues, tripling the size of our staff and we are currently a reigning Ad Age Southeast Small Agency of the Year. These accomplishments are a testament to the talent and tenacity of our team.

We are happy to officially put this matter to rest and to continue the jobs we love with our focus on the future.

Vest’s release comes after the judge in the case said, “There is just a small amount of gullibility and greed on the part of the victims.”

As noted yesterday, spokespeople for McKinney and Egg Strategy–two of the other agencies that were defrauded by Grizack–have declined to comment on the case. However, according to Grizack’s defense attorney Bernard Desrosiers, McKinney CEO Brad Brinegar said words to the effect of, “My client [meaning Grizack] placed a bet, and it went badly.” Desrosier added, “[Bill] wanted to please people and thought that if he continued working it would pay off.”

We are not yet done reporting on Grizack, and we have already received a fair amount of additional information. Multiple parties have told us that the former executive strategist had been living in the Boulder, Colorado area with his family and “looking pretty healthy” while awaiting sentencing. (When he pled guilty in March, he listed mailing addresses in both Lafayette, CO and West Hollywood, CA).

Another source claims to have recently overheard Grizack tell an unnamed party that he “currently works in four states,” though that statement would no longer be accurate as he has now begun to serve his sentence of 57 to 81 months in the North Carolina prison system.

Early this year, Don Saynor left JWT Canada after more than 16 years to found The Jack Russell Agency along with partner and fellow JWT (accounts) veteran Ali Dalfen.

Their stated goal with this Toronto-based venture is “to create real work for real people,” and they produced an introductory video of sorts in which they reveal that they hate the very same things that real people like you hate! Of course we mean “the traditional, slow and antiquated agency model,” along with things like conference calls and creatives getting bitchy over titles.

You’ve been here before.

That was funny, though they missed the part where the agency mutes the call and everyone proceeds to talk about how the client’s marketing team is staffed by a bunch of idiots. (We speak from experience here.)

We also really wanted that ECD to be the Trivago guy for some reason. They look very similar what with their white skin and grey hair!

So how is this new agency different from other agencies? Jack Russell is very small like the dog, with “a tight crew ensuring that each member of the team brings value to the table.” And they’ll turn to a revolving crew of freelancers to create just the right sort of team to work on each project.

Saynor says:

“We believe in using creativity to solve business problems, we just don’t believe in all the crap that happens in between.

Our agency is comprised of creative thinkers, be that planners, producers, writers, art directors and account managers. While we’d certainly be happy to win a Gold Lion, making things that speak to and engage actual humans is our focus.”

Regarding the video above, he says the agency “can’t make a shameless self promotion video boasting about our more efficient business model and not be committed to following through,” adding, “We aren’t bogged down by too many conflicting point of views from CEO, CCO, CD, ECD’s. The creative process doesn’t need to be complicated when the team knows our core values.”

This business model sounds very similar to other recently launched ventures like San Francisco’s Partners in Crime, Jaime Robinson and Lisa Clunie’s Joan and Erich & Kallman. Seems like quite a few disparate creative vets are reaching the same conclusions around the same time. We might even call it a trend!

Interestingly, the Canadian agency plans to focus on U.S.-based brands. It already has Canadian and stateside clients including a major liquor company, and it plans to officially announce its roster in the coming weeks and months.

Publicis agencies Leo Burnett Detroit and DigitasLBi Detroit will soon merge, creating a new unit called Engage M-1 that will be dedicated to serving their shared General Motors accounts.

From a Publicis spokesperson:

“After years working together on General Motors in Southeast Michigan, DigitasLBi and Leo Burnett will come together as a united  partnership—Engage M-1 (reflecting the central roadway of Detroit)—serving our General Motors clients including Buick and GMC.”

The spokesperson told us that, while the soon-to-be-united team “shares a mission of providing world class work to our clients,” both agencies will retain their separate brands and office spaces.

This shift follows an April Adweek report in which sources speculated that a “blind RFP” making its way around Detroit-area agency circles amounted to the launch of a creative review for the Buick and GM accounts. General Motors declined to confirm the news at the time, telling Adweek that Leo Burnett and DigitasLBi remained its agencies of record and stating, “We don’t comment on rumors and speculation or on the particulars of our agency projects.”

That said, the client did move its Chevy Silverado truck line business from Leo Burnett to Commonwealth//McCann last year in a shift that led to a round of downsizing at the latter’s Detroit office.

The Publicis spokesperson did not provide more information regarding any staffing changes that might accompany the merger or clarify when any related operational changes will take place.

Factory Design Labs of Denver has been through a few major changes in recent years, most prominent among them the departure of former CEO Scott Mellin, who was demoted to chief brand officer and replaced by predecessor and agency founder Jonas Tempel.

The company also recently pivoted from being a design agency to also providing media services to both clients and advertisers. But according to a story that ran in the Denver Post over the weekend, “the agency has left several magazines with unpaid bills and raised the ire of media outlets and at least one company that paid Factory to place ads.”

Staff reporter Jason Blevins writes that Factory told multiple outdoor sports publications that it would be unable to pay for ads it had placed on behalf of its media clients, many of which are area ski resorts or producers of outdoor sports equipment. An ad sales executive from an unnamed national magazine said:

“They have a lot of outstanding balances and delinquent payments with us for all my clients that had media managed through Factory … I was flabbergasted when (a client) shared with me that they had indeed paid Factory and Factory was not paying us for those bills.”

The accusation, then, is that the agency accepted full payment from its clients before telling the media companies that ran the ads that it would be unable to fulfill its part of the agreement and attempting to negotiate alternate deals that paid as little as 8 cents on the dollar, according to Snow Magazine publisher Barbara Sanders. As one anonymous media executive put it, “Where did the money go?”

Blevins contacted various media executives who declined to comment on the record. Agency president Bob Reimer also did not say anything for the Denver Post story, citing unspecified “confidentiality and non-defamation agreements.”

We recently spoke to a source with direct knowledge of the matter who claimed that Factory Design Labs made repeated attempts to spin the story told by these media partners as one for which the agency is not to blame.

According to additional sources who spoke to The Denver Post on condition of anonymity, Factory blames its inability to honor business agreements on the loss of The North Face account. It’s true that the shop had been AOR on that business since 2007, but rumors of a split began circulating almost two years ago when Mekanism took over responsibility for the outdoor gear company’s TV campaigns. The first such effort launched in November 2014, and Mekanism officially became the client’s lead creative agency partner with the “Never Stop ____” campaign less than a year later.

Regarding the alleged non-payment, Sanders told the Denver Post, “…no one is talking about it in public. It’s like it didn’t happen.”

Publicis Groupe officially updated the long-rumored talks between itself and Samsung regarding ownership of the latter’s agency network Cheil Worldwide…by stating that it is no longer involved in those discussions.

This morning, spokespeople for Maurice Levy’s holding company told Reuters and other outlets that talks regarding a “possible investment” in the network, which owns some or all of McKinney, The Barbarian Group and London’s BMB, have collapsed.

Samsung remains a Publicis Groupe client, however, and the latter’s statement aims to dispel any rumors about that pairing:

“The strategic relationship with Samsung is as strong as ever and we will continue to work daily with Samsung and Cheil Worldwide to make the brand even more successful.”

When reading that statement, remember that Samsung concluded its late 2014 global review by sticking with Publicis and adding Rosetta to its agency roster.

The Publicis/Cheil talks were first reported in January–a time when the holding company was in better financial shape prior to losing the P&G media review. As recently as February, rumors held that Samsung would soon accept Publicis’ offer to become Cheil’s largest shareholder with a 30 percent stake. (Samsung Electronics and its engineering wing C&T currently own approximately 25 percent.)

It’s unclear why the talks broke down at this time, because The Korea Times reported yesterday that Samsung still very much wants to sell the Cheil organization to someone. From that report’s anonymous source:

“At least three investors including one Chinese real estate company showed keen interest in acquiring the stake in Cheil. Working-level discussions are underway. The key issue is price.”

Note the last line and the fact that both of Samsung’s U.S.-based agencies have struggled in recent months. McKinney lost its biggest account, Nationwide, to Ogilvy in February and went through a significant round of downsizing afterward. Still, the North Carolina shop has been producing a steady stream of work: it recently won headlines for a stunt based on North Carolina’s infamous “bathroom bill” and picked up the TuneIn account without a review.

The Barbarian Group is also in the midst of a significant restructuring following the departures of its CEO, founder, owner, chief creative officer, head of talent, head of accounts and more under the leadership of former Cheil executive Peter Kim.

In barely related news, we are sad to report that Mr. Levy has yet to make any public jokes about the “colossal” size of Sir Martin Sorrell’s (pay) package.