Defence Force moves to Havas from George Patterson Y&R
Mobile Medic
George Patterson Y&R Melbourne has lost one of its biggest clients with the government Defence Force Recruiting account moving to Havas Worldwide after a six month pitch.
The move will surprise many after GPY&R held the account, its biggest in the Melbourne office, for 13 years and won a string of awards for the client, including several Lions for the Mobile Medic app last year.
It is a boost for Havas, which has a small satellite office of seven in Melbourne, but is expected to manage the business from its North Sydney base.
The move suggests the client could be looking for more innovative technology solutions like Mobile Medic as it looks to attract young people to join the armed forces, as Havas has a track record of tech-led campaigns with The World’s Most Powerful Arm and Fundawear.
But it is a blow for GPY&R, which has shone in its Melbourne office in recent years but struggled to gain traction in Sydney. The Federal Government makes up a large part of its business.
The account will be entirely handed over in March 2014.
The release:
The Department of Defence has announced the signing of a contract for the provision of creative advertising and digital services to Defence Force Recruiting.
The three year contract was awarded to Havas Worldwide Australia Pty Ltd following a detailed evaluation process, conducted in accordance with the Commonwealth Procurement Rules and Defence procurement policy.
The contract services cover the development of advertising materials, primarily for television, cinema, magazines and newspapers, and digital advertising and other content for the Defencejobs website and for use in various social media channels.
A four month transition period will commence from today.
interesting lack of reference and spokesperson here… questions?
User ID not verified.
Congratulations Mr G what a huge effort
User ID not verified.
Biggest win for any agency this year and well deserved to the guys at Havas, not only did they beat the long standing incumbant, but also some of the best – Host, Clems, Droga..
Solid work guys and congratulations.
User ID not verified.
Why? No really, why?
User ID not verified.
GPY&R consistently turn out great work for this client, especially digital.
In fact, I’ve lost count of the number of times I’ve used their work as the digital benchmark in presentations.
Another case (TAC being a recent example) of changing agencies for the wrong reason.
User ID not verified.
If it isn’t the quality of the work that triggered the change, it must be budget.
Agree with @KGB…the recent http://www.defencejobs.gov.au/anytimeanywhere/ was absolutely OUTSTANDING
User ID not verified.
Would have to be one of the toughest gigs going.
How do you sell a product no sane youngster is remotely interested in?
User ID not verified.
Lots of awards, industry loves the work. Any info on recruiting success rates over the past decade?
User ID not verified.
It’s always sad to hear of the loss of a major long term account but these things don’t happen for “no reason”. Cost cutting is sighted as one reason in these comments but, there is almost no mention of how the campaign performed over the past 13 years. As a guy working in digital I was always intrigued each time Patts launched a new interactive site for defence forces – but I could never get past the sign up process before being confused or loosing interest. As “creative” as they were – I suspect they were in reality convoluted. How many people really engaged with them? It’s a fair question to ask how successful the Patts work over the last 13 years has actually been in driving recruitment.
User ID not verified.
That is a fair question to ask.
I was a judge at this years Effies and read the long term effectiveness paper that Patts wrote for ADF.
I vividly remember the 10 year shift in total target achievement as i was astounded. When Patts won the business target achievement was in the mid-50%, in 2013 it is sitting at around 96%.
I’m sure that there are some roles that are harder to fill that aren’t performing as well, but overall that in my opinion is long term success.
This decision it would seem had nothing to do with creative or effectiveness and plenty to do with bureaucracy and procurement.
User ID not verified.
Hopefully the boomerang will return Defence Force back to Melbourne.
User ID not verified.
Re Effie’s Judge’s comment above, the “effectiveness paper that Patts wrote” May not be the most source of information on ADF recruiting data. Simply Google “Defence Force recruiting statistics” to see the situation for yourself. It’s not great at all, with recruiting figures way down across the Navy, Air Force and Army. And our recruiting rates fall well behind the UK and the US results.
Of course this isn’t all the fault of advertising. But it should be cause for some of us in the industry to step back and look at the big / real picture.
User ID not verified.