Pitch Watch: Beam Suntory realigns creative; The Carole King Musical taps media agency; Recognise appoints creative
Mumbrella casts an eye over the major media, creative and public relations pitches at play in market.
In today’s wrap up: Beam Suntory (Creative); Beautiful: The Carole King Musical (media); Recognise (creative).
Beam Suntory exits The Works after 14 years
Global drinks giant Beam Suntory has ended its award-winning 14-year relationship with Sydney agency The Works after a decision to realigning its creative globally.
The Works was the lead global creative agency on the Jim Beam account for three years, introducing Mila Kunis as the global face of the brand.
The agency was also behind a huge PR coupe for Canadian Club when the brand convinced David Boon, a former spruiker for VB and one time holder of the world record for consuming cans of beer on the Sydney to London flight, to become the face of the brand, declaring he was over beer.
The agency had won multiple Effie Awards for its work including the Grand Effie for Candian Club in 2015 and an international Effie for Jim Beam in 2013.
Beam Suntory marketing director Trent Chapman, said the decision to part ways with the agency was part of a global realignment, the the review process still underway.
“Beam Suntory have made a decision to re-align their business globally,” Chapman said.
“The team at The Works have done a fantastic job building our brands over our 14-year relationship and they leave both Jim Beam and Canadian Club in a very healthy position.”
The Works co-founder and creative partner, Damian Pincus, said the agency was proud of its heritage with Beam Suntory.
“There aren’t many agencies in Australia that can boast the longevity of relationship The Works has had with the Beam family,” Pincus said.
“It was one that started with a single brand, Jim Beam, and ultimately led to us become the lead global agency on the business. While you never want such a successful relationship to end, a decision has been made internationally to take the business in a new direction meaning it is no longer feasible to continue our partnership.”
He said while it was hard to lose the business, it opened new doors for the agency, having charted sales increases for brands in categories that were in decline.
The agency will continue working with Beam Suntory until February.
Beautiful: The Carole King Musical appoints media agency
Michael Cassel Group has appointed Match Media to launch their newest production Beautiful: The Carole King Musical.
The account, which Match Media says bills $3m, will include media strategy, planning and buying across all channels, plus social and analytics.
The musical will premiere in Sydney in September 2017 at the Sydney Lyric Theatre.
Julie Ott, head of marketing at Michael Cassel Group, said : “Match have been our media partner on Kinky Boots for over a year now and we have a strong partnership that is grounded in the perfect mix of creativity and ROI generation. When we were looking for a media partner for Beautiful it made sense to extend this relationship with Match and continue our successful relationship.”
Zara Cobb, head of planning & knowledge at Match Media, added: “We have worked with the Michael Cassel Group for two years on both Les Miserables (Digital) and Kinky Boots and we couldn’t be more thrilled to be working with them now on Beautiful: the Carole King Musical. We are excited about bringing this award-winning show to life in Sydney.”
Recognise appoints creative agency
WPP AUNZ’s specialist creative agency 1 Kent St has been appointed by Recognise, the movement seeking to recognise Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples in the Australian Constitution.
The agency’s remit includes strategy, creative and digital elements for the development of a campaign created in conjunction with media agency Ikon.
Creative Director Simon Collins said the 1 Kent St campaign would target all Australians, including Aboriginal and Torres Straits Islander communities.
“The issues of indigenous rights and Constitutional change have many unique challenges, and we’re looking forward to being part of a movement to drive real change,” he said.
Previous campaign work was executed by Lawrence Creative Strategy, and several members of that team, including 1 Kent St group account director Jen Clarke, will work on this next phase of communication,.
Recognise joint campaign director, Tim Gartrell, said: “Change to our Constitution can only come with the approval of a majority of voters in a majority of states. That’s why there needs to be high levels of public awareness and a very large and broad movement of support.
“Succeeding at a referendum is challenging, but our Constitution needs to tell our country’s whole story. It is a major issue and one that affects us all, because it is about who we are as a nation. We look forward to working with 1 Kent St on this important national campaign.”
Work on the campaign strategy has already begun.
End of a truly impressive era.
“The Bourbon” punched amazingly hard back in the day, and if Kev and Dame had known how to enter Effies back then, it would have won, too.
“Over Beer?” speaks for itself, despite being panned by the “bubble” at first.
This is a sad day indeed, as centralization (always a mistake when running a complex system) has carried the day.
My hats off to The Works and the Australian clients (Baldock, Sykes and Chappo) alike.
Onwards and upwards for all and sundry.
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And Ray Noble! How could I forget Ray?
Hats off to you, too, mate.
Apologies: haven’t seen you in person for too long.
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