It took us a while to get to the bottom of the Jeep/Global Hue story earlier this year, but eventually we found that the client’s parent company FIAT Chrysler had ended its relationship with the agency and would be moving forward without a creative AOR.
Chrysler seemed to be following the lead of other clients in deciding to work with a “dedicated roster of agencies” rather than choosing individual shops to run its various brands. (Wieden+Kennedy’s status as AOR for the larger Chrysler/Dodge brands was the exception to that rule.)
Now, however, the company appears to have changed its mind, telling AdAge that it seeks creative AORs for both Jeep and Alfa Romeo and that it will issue briefs.
In March, the client stayed within the aforementioned roster when seeking an agency to promote its fancy Italian sports car, choosing Doner and The Richards Group to assist with its plans to “recolonize America” by selling “400 or so” Spiders to balding North Americans. (You may recall Doner’s U.K.-based “made of red” campaign from earlier this summer.) Now the client has a new new car called “the Giulia” to promote, and it wants to hire a single agency to do so; AdAge’s sources claim that ten shops are currently waiting for news on the pitch.
This is standard operating procedure for FIAT, which worked with Global Hue on a project basis before bringing the agency on as AOR.
Despite releasing briefs and holding formal reviews for the two brands in question, FIAT may still stay within its existing network: sources confirm that Doner will be one of the agencies pitching Jeep. Doner also has larger goals, namely an Alfa Romeo ad during next year’s Super Bowl.
For the record, FIAT emphasizes that CMO Olivier Francois still “welcomes creative ideas from all our global agencies for all brands.”