Respondents: Bureaucracy Hinders Creative Process
NEW YORK–A survey of client and agency executives has revealed that Unilever’s relationships with its four primary roster shops are fraught with bureaucracy and inconsistency, sources said.
Unilever commissioned Research International, a London consultancy, to conduct the survey as part of a global effort to study the ad development process and raise creative standards. The questionnaire was sent to Unilever’s top marketing executives worldwide and their counterparts at core agencies Ammirati Puris Lintas, J. Walter Thompson, McCann-Erickson and Ogilvy & Mather, sources said.
Executives on both sides bemoaned the cumbersome nature of the client-agency relationship, according to sources. Agency respondents saw a glaring need to streamline the client approval process.
“The results gave statistical significance to things we already intuitively were aware of,” said one source.
The survey findings are strikingly similar to issues that led Unilever’s main rival, Procter & Gamble, to convene its “agency renewal project” last year to examine its creative
relationships. The project, which is expected to run another six to 12 months, could trigger shifts in agency compensation, account staffing and management.
Unilever will be conducting a “symposium” with roster shops in the next few months to discuss survey results and establish its own guidelines, sources said.
Executives at Unilever did not return several calls seeking comment. Research International could not be reached.
Unilever’s navel-gazing comes as the Anglo-Dutch marketer explores creative options beyond its formal roster. Goodby, Silverstein & Partners in San Francisco was handed the U.S. assignment for a new “natural” line of personal care products for 1999 with $20 million in ad support, sources said [Adweek, Aug. 10]. That parallels a move Unilever made four years ago, when it tapped Bartle Bogle Hegarty to handle a British deodorant brand.
Unilever Polls Ad Executives
