Procter & Gamble has awarded the business for its various grooming brands to Grey. Yesterday Adweek’s Andrew McMains reported that the company had chosen to move its Venus, Art of Shaving and Braun accounts to the WPP shop, which already won Gillette back in 2013.
All four brands had previously been with BBDO.
A client spokesperson told McMains that the move was not a reflection on BBDO’s performance and reassured AdAge that the shop “will continue to remain a P&G roster agency in good standing”; BBDO still produces mostly international campaigns for P&G brands like Pantene.
More from the AdAge statement:
“We’re consolidating our grooming business to one lead agency to facilitate deeper category mastery, and to more effectively integrate creative execution across consumer touch points to build our brands.”
Translation: P&G, like Kraft and so many other large clients, is doubling down on digital…and its executives aren’t feeling particularly generous at the moment.
Here’s the internal memo from Grey Chairman/CEO Jim Heekin:
We received the terrific news that Procter & Gamble has named Grey its sole lead agency in the Grooming category.
In this consolidation, we have been awarded the global creative responsibility for three outstanding brands: the Venus women’s shaving line, Braun razors and The Art of Shaving line in addition to our global Gillette business.
This is a tremendous vote of confidence from our longtime partner as we prepare to celebrate our 60th anniversary with P&G next year.
P&G has said this move will enable them to better leverage the power of their entire grooming portfolio and we intend to exceed all their expectations.
Congratulations to our entire P&G team and special thanks to our Famously Effective Gillette team who has taken the brand to new creative heights in every channel. Our deepest thanks go to a great client.