Dos Equis Selects Sid Lee as US Agency of Record

Heineken USA has appointed Sid Lee as its U.S. creative agency of record. The global agency will lead the account out of its Los Angeles and New York offices. "Dos Equis is a truly iconic brand, one that has an incredible advertising heritage built over a number of years and campaigns. As such, we areexcited to partner with Sid Lee as together, we write the next chapter for Dos Equis," Heineken USA CMO Jonnie Cahill said in a statement. "We have been admirers of Sid Lee's work and have been consistently impressed by both their strategic thinking and their creativity through an extremely rigorous pitch process. We're hard at work already on a series of creative executions across multiple brand touch points that will debut in the coming months." Dos Equis previously worked with Accenture's Droga5 as creative agency of record. Droga5 took over creative for Dos Equis in 2017, a surprise move that came without a review and ended a relationship dating back over a decade with Havas, which created the brand's once-ubiquitous "The Most Interesting Man in the World" campaign that spawned both ad-inspired memes and accusations of misogyny over the course of its run. "Droga5 have been a valuable partner as we have evolved the Dos Equis brand together over the past three years, and we are grateful for their partnership," Heineken USA said in a statement. "As we continue to review business performance and look at where we envision Dos Equis going directionally, we felt the brand would benefit from a creative review at this time. This is not directly because of recent work or implications of Covid-19." Sid Lee will be tasked with leading a new creative outlook for Dos Equis with the goal of further engaging its audience and expanding its popularity with new and existing customers. The win follows Sid Lee's recent acquisition of Los Angeles-based social agency Denizen. "This is a landmark win for us—a marquee brand with a rich creative history. From the synergy that our teams share to our joint commitment to highlighting the storied brand's tremendous cultural currency, we are delighted to become a creative ally for Dos Equis and the Heineken USA team," said Sid Lee USA CEO Andy Bateman in a statement. "We look forward to developing breakthrough work that marks the next stage of the brand's evolution. Jonnie and the team have been terrific partners throughout the process, and it's just these types of client partnerships that make us want to push harder for the best ideas." The appointment follows Heineken expanding its relationships with Dentsu and Publicis as part of a revamping of its global agency model. Heineken USA's appointment of Sid Lee follows an independent review process for the Dos Equis brand. Another Heineken-owned brand, Lagunitas recently appointed Canvas Worldwide as its media agency of record.