MediaCom retains $20m Mars account locally after global internal review
GroupM agency MediaCom has retained the business of Mars Inc. in Australia following an internal global review, GroupM has confirmed to Mumbrella.
This comes three-and-a-half years after Mars appointed MediaCom to its buying and planning for its stable of brands, which includes M&Ms, Snickers, Whiskas, Smackos, Masterfoods and Wrigley.
The deal includes each of Mars Wrigley, Mars Petcare and Mars Food segments and will run through to 2025.
Brands within Mars Inc
According to Nielsen Ad Intel, Mars AU reported an estimated $20m in ad spend during 2021, similar spend to Unilever.
The global review throughout 2021 came through Mars’ new “vision for marketing”, called “Building Brands for Mutual Value”.
Yaron Farizon, MediaCom Australia CEO, said: “Mars has been a long-term client for us here in Australia and we are super excited and proud to continue our partnership with Mars locally, doing work that pushes boundaries.”
The extension of the relationship will also engage GroupM agency Essence, helping Mars develop its “approach to auction-based media”. It is unclear what the local implications of this aspect will be.
Local CEO, Yaron Farizon
MediaCom global said: “Essence will enable Mars to reach and engage consumers, and will be responsible for Mars’ fast-growing programmatic video, social and search investment, establishing specialist hub capabilities regionally in Europe, Asia and Latin America.”
Rankin Carroll, chief brand & content officer at Mars Wrigley and executive sponsor for media, Mars Inc. said: “We set out a detailed vision and operating plan for our next wave of media transformation at Mars. We were impressed by WPP’s commitment to evolving their own integrated team to deliver that vision, building on our trusted partnership with MediaCom but adding in fresh, digital-first thinking from other GroupM partners, including Essence.”
Retaining the business comes off the back of several more wins for the GroupM agency. This included a global consolidation with WPP for Coca-Cola in November, handing the business to MediaCom locally from UM. The agency was also the beneficiary of a global review from pharma giant Bayer in September, moving its media account in Australia across from Omnicom Media Group agency PHD.
In December OMD’s Mike Worden was appointed as MediaCom’s Sydney managing director, the agency also promoted Adele Burke to general manager. Worden was brought in as a direct replacement for Ben McCallum, who moved to UM as MD in Sydney.
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Calum Jaspan was news editor at Mumbrella, based in Melbourne. He was also the producer and host of the Mumbrellacast. He left Mumbrella in May 2023.
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