Spotlight appoints PHD to media account
Spotlight Group has appointed PHD to its $39m media account following a competitive tender process. The account is currently held by Nunn Media in Melbourne.
Mumbrella understands Nunn Media did not participate in the pitch process.
PHD will take over the account for the group’s brands including Spotlight, Mountain Designs, Harris Scarfe and Anaconda from 1 August.
@Mumbrella
Is it true that Spotlight Group is a significant shareholder in the incumbent Nunn Media?
Hi Wayne,
I have been told this, and am looking into it.
I will come back to you.
Thanks for checking,
Vivienne – Mumbrella
Hi Wayne,
I can confirm that Morry Fraid and Zac Fried, the co-owners of Spotlight, are a director and alternate director of Nunn Media respectively. Avi Gilboa, the group managing director of Spotlight Group, is also a director. Spotlight does have a stake in Nunn Media.
They became involved in Nunn Media in 2014 after Nunn Media bought out Kruse Media Services.
I’m told there were “cultural differences” which led to Nunn Media not participating in the pitch.
Thanks,
Vivienne – Mumbrella
Matt Nunn has very high moral standards and expects that from all around him. I know of him resigning clients historically who don’t meet his partner criteria so does not surprise me at all that he declined to pitch for spotlight and put his staff first. With that said the next board meeting should be pretty awkward:)
Considering they ran parts of the no to same sex marriage campaign, I’d question their morals.
Does anyone else thinks its a little more than “cultural differences” between Nunn and Spotlight when Spotlight are shareholders of Nunn…? It must have been some “difference” or Spotlight uncovered something major was up and had to get out…. smells fishy…
Yep, for Mr Nunn to pull the pin on this relationship and refuse to get involved in a pitch would suggest not all was great for a while. Who knows why and who really cares. PHD is a good business, Nunn is a good business and Spotlight had a great run with Nunn and I’m sure will continue that with PHD.
As “One who missed out” mentioned Matt Nunn has resigned clients in the past. With Nunn choosing to not participate in the pitch it looks more like they wanted Spotlight out rather than the other way round.
Who’s saying they didn’t participate in the process? If a client had equity in the business, it would make sense to stand your ground and not join the dog n pony show, but I would be staggered if they didn’t try and save the business and the dedicated team throughout the process, otherwise the people they are ‘trying to protect’ will become redundant…Doesn’t make sense to me…
As a former publisher who worked on a significant number of campaigns for Spotlight via Nunn, I can certainly see where the cultural differences mentioned may have arisen.
Conservative direction and a controlling marketing team would not mesh well with planners pushing for something a little different.
There’s a good story here Mumbrella, keep digging.
After reading the 2 articles in AFR I think it’s pretty easy to work out why Nunn didn’t want to be involved with Spotlight or any other supplier by the sounds of it