- Gregory Solman and Andrew McMains

LOS ANGELES Iconic vacuum cleaner company Hoover is seeking a shop for creative and media duties, with information requests issued to undisclosed agencies earlier this month, sources said.

Hoover's ad spending declined almost 30 percent year over year to $25 million in 2007, per Nielsen Monitor Plus. The company spent about $1 million in U.S. media during the first quarter of 2008.

Sources said the review would be conducted without a search consultant, with agencies asked to present spec work and finalists expected to present at the client headquarters in Glen Willow, Ohio. The review is expected to conclude by mid-July.

The client declined comment.
 
There is currently no agency for Hoover, which most recently worked with Omnicom Group's Martin/Williams, Minneapolis. Wyse Advertising in Cleveland remains the agency for the Dirt Devil brand.
 
"We had a project relationship where we produced three commercials and did Web work," said Mike Gray, president of Martin/Williams. Gray said the relationship was over by the end of 2007 and acknowledged that the agency is no longer working with a client.
 
Martin/Williams' three spots each emphasized a different specialized product with heavy use of visual effects. In one spot, a gray dog against a white carpet multiplies into many, spreading pet hair gleefully over the living room, requiring the Wind Tunnel. Another ad shows a red wine spill being sucked forcefully by an ominously approaching Steam Vac. A third spot for the Floor Mate showed a boy's muddy book bag turning into a team of mud-soaked rugby players. The most recent tagline is "Hoover understands that no mess is a small mess."
 
The spots ran mostly in the second half of last year.