Burger chain Jack in the Box is not quite ready to call David&Goliath its new lead creative agency, but it has officially ended its relationship with Dick Sittig’s Secret Weapon Marketing.
When it added David&Goliath to its roster after a review last year, Jack in the Box claimed it would retain Secret Weapon (which has handled creative duties for the brand for over 20 years) as its lead agency but was reaching out to other agencies for a product launch.
Instead, the fast food chain stopped working with Secret Weapon last month. The client is now “working to…determine our formal relationship” with L.A.’s David&Goliath, which joined its creative roster early this year and created its “Legendary” ad for the Super Bowl. The decision to switch agencies also follows Jack in the Box’s promotion of Keith Guilbault to the chief marketing officer role in late 2013.
“As the Jack in the Box brand continues to evolve, we will be ending our relationship with creative agency Secret Weapon Marketing,” a brand representative told Adweek, adding, “We have the utmost respect and appreciation for Secret Weapon Marketing’s contributions to the growth of our brand and our business over the last 20 years, and have truly valued their partnership.”
Sittig, who has expressed some very strong feelings about originality in advertising, launched Secret Weapon specifically to handle Jack in the Box’s marketing needs after taking the client with him from Chiat when the agency won Taco Bell. Aside from forming Secret Weapon, he is perhaps best known for his role in creating the Energizer Bunny while with DDB in 1989.
Secret Weapon’s website claims the agency limits its client roster to three intentionally, with its other two clients listed as 1-800-DENTIST and SoCal Honda Dealers. Jack in the Box has always been the agency’s main focus and its primary source of revenue, so the loss will undoubtedly have a major impact on its business.