Here’s a massive Friday News Dump from IPG: the offices of Mullen and Lowe and Partners around the world will merge to form Mullen Lowe Group.
That means no more Lowe Campbell Ewald and no more Mullen…as we knew them, at least.
The release, which describes the resulting Group as “a creatively-driven global agency network with a strong, shared entrepreneurial heritage and challenger mentality,” also tells us that Mullen CEO Alex Leikikh will be the new entity’s chief executive. Michael Wall, CEO of Lowe and Partners up to this point, helped “create the roadmap” for the move but will have no role in MLG because…?
IPG CEO Michael Roth, citing the groups’ “complimentary cultures,” says the goal of this play is to continue Lowe’s “global growth” in part by giving Leikikh “a global stage” and empowering him to lead “one of the industry’s outstanding creative networks.”
Leikikh himself says:
“We are only as good as the talent we can attract and we owe it to our clients to put the world’s best minds to bear on their brands.”
Of course, there’s also talk of MORE DIGITAL from Wall, who says “The US is the key piece to accelerating this performance.”
On the organizational front, this means:
- The new Mullen Lowe Group will oversee Mullen’s offices in Boston, LA, and North Carolina; they will now be Mullen Lowe
- New York’s Lowe Profero will “report into” MLG, which will open its own separate office in Manhattan
- Campbell Ewald will “continue to access the international network as required” and will “operate independently” within the MLG network
- MLG will also oversee all Lowe offices in the UK
The release contains no information on the most important aspect of the move: who will get hired and who will get fired. We also have no idea how the new entity’s logo will look, presumably because IPG was in such a rush to get the news out.
Here’s a bit more on Campbell Ewald:
“The agency will unbundle from the operations of the Lowe network, preserve the Campbell Ewald brand, and return to its roots as an independent agency within the IPG and Mullen Lowe Group portfolios. It will continue to access the the international network as and when required. Operating under the Campbell Ewald name, the agency will continue to serve its current clients and maintain all four of its offices.”
We would say updates to come, but we assume that this change will not affect Mullen’s inexplicable refusal to respond to our queries on anything.
Seriously, you guys.