Aside from the daily question from the Anon tip box that asks us (every single day) what is going on with Element 79 out of Chicago — we hear that tomorrow is the lay-off day for all those involved in the recent deluge of losses that the agency has incurred in the past couple of months.
The biggest of them all announced a month ago with the Gatorade and Tropicana brands on the move to to TBWA\Chiat\Day and Arnell Group, respectively.
TBWA\C\D, Playa del Rey, Calif., will handle Gatorade, and Arnell, New York, is now going to handle Tropicana. Both shops are owned by Omnicom Group, as is Element 79.
Element 79 lost three other PepsiCo brands: Tostitos — from PepsiCo’s Frito-Lay division — and Propel Fitness Water, both of which shifted to sister shop Goodby, Silverstein & Partners in San Francisco, and Lays — also part of Frito-Lay — which moved to sister shop Juniper Park in Toronto, a subsidiary of BBDO.
All of this under rumours that there is going to be a massive shakeup in management at E79 — but probably like a game of musical chairs with too many seats.
People will get moved around to other Omnicom companies to work anew — with no real heavy losses in the upper ranks (answering the question again — How is having a job at a big agency like working for the Bush administration?)
Please feel free to share any other stories coming out — be interesting to know what the hell the plan is — for example — will they merge with DDB Chicago?