Vegemite drops JWT for Thinkerbell after 74 years
One of the world’s longest agency-client relationships has come to an end, with the creative account for Vegemite moving from J Walter Thomson to Thinkerbell after 74 years.
The review of the roster was triggered by last year’s sale of the Vegemite brand by Mondelez Foods to the Australian-owned Bega Cheese. JWT was the agency behind “Happy Little Vegemites”, arguably Australia’s best remembered advertising campaign of all time.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0yA98MujNeM
Then move marks the biggest win yet for the PWC-backed Thinkerbell, which was formed in Melbourne by creatives Jim Ingram and Ben Couzens and strategist Adam Ferrier just nine months ago.
Congrats Bega. An Australian company backing Australian agencies is great to see. Best of luck.
PWC an Australian company?
My thoughts exactly! On that note, what do billings look like with Tinkerbell? Are you being invoiced by Tinkerbell or by PWC? Is it going to be PWC in Australia or Singapore?
Bega, should consider this hard, if they really want to be an ‘Australian’ brand, supporting Australian businesses.
“minority investment” is the key term here
That loss won’t mean much to the bottom line, but it will definitely bruise a few egos.
Nice one Thinkerbell.
Congrats Adam & team. Lookforward to seeing the next instalment from Vegemite. Def a good innings from JWT.
If it aint broke, don’t fix it. Another new broom, marketing wizard from Kraft (Mondelez) on the change the agency, justifying his appointment, maybe he didn’t like someone at JWT. Do PWC consult to Bega?
I worked on Vegemite & Peanut Butter at MOJO Melbourne in the late 80’s before Kraft was bought by Philip Morris.
I also worked on Vegemite when it was owned by Kraft, a very long standing client of MOJO/MDA in Melbourne. NOT JWT
Doris writing the press releases
Congrats Thinkerbell. Great win. And we’ll done Bega for choosing them.
Awesome job Adam, Ben and Jim. Waiting to see how Thinkerbell treats one of Australia’s best known icons.
Congrats Adam, Jim, Cuz.
Looking forward to seeing the work.
thx mate
The image of a suit and tie wearing Ben Shepherd dancing in circles with glee to the tune of the ‘Happy Little Vegemite’ song comes to mind.
Congatulations PWC!
Hi just to be clear – PwC have a minority investment in Thinkerbell A fact we’re extremely proud of. We love working with them.
However, PwC were not involved in any way on the Bega pitch / work.
Have a great day. And thanks loads for the well wishes.
The work, the work, the work
Let’s wait for the magic…
The big cheese of marketing stated “we felt the time was right to refresh our creative agency” and there may be many reasons for the change; however, perhaps Mr CMO didn’t realise during the 74 years that JWT handled Vegemite they actually changed their creative, strategy & account management teams many times.So, in fact the creative had been refreshed many times.