After we tried for well over a week to get Mullen’s public relations team to give us a statement, a source has confirmed that the agency lost the Highmark BCBS account and that its Pittsburgh office will close.
Just over a month ago, we reported that Mullen Pittsburgh’s largest client was conducting an agency review in the interest of adjusting to the changing “healthcare landscape,” and an unnamed source who may or may not work for Mullen has confirmed to the Pittsburgh Business-Times that the agency did not win the review for an account it held for 15 years.
Agency representatives appear to have offered the Business-Times the same amount of information they gave us, but the source apparently told the pub that resumes from Mullen Pittsburgh’s approximately 45 employees are “flooding” area agencies.
Highmark provided Mullen with nearly $5M annually, a total that amounted to a majority of the agency’s revenue. The client’s spokesperson did not offer details on the soon-to-be-resolved review, saying simply that “Our decision will be very soon.”
Updates as we receive them.