General Motors expects to save about $2 billion during the next five years by centralizing most of the global advertising for its Chevrolet brand.
The Detroit company said Tuesday that two competing agencies, San Francisco-based Goodby, Silverstein and Partners, and New York-based McCann Erickson Worldwide, will join to form a new company to handle most of Chevy’s ads.
Goodby, Silverstein now does Chevy advertising in the U.S., including the “Chevy Runs Deep” campaign featuring the voice of television and movie star Tim Allen. McCann handles Chevy ads in China, Latin America, Mexico, Canada and other markets. The new company, called Commonwealth, is an equal joint venture between the agencies.
Among the new agency’s first tasks: Evaluate the “Chevy Runs Deep” campaign and decide whether to keep it. GM global marketing chief Joel Ewanick on Tuesday questioned whether Chevrolet needs a theme like that, but also said the campaign is gaining acceptance in many countries. “It’s open for discussion and we haven’t decided that,” he said, adding that a decision should come this summer.
“Chevy Runs Deep” is a series of ads showing how cars and trucks are part of significant moments in people’s lives, such as bringing a newborn baby home from the hospital.
Before the consolidation, which begins immediately, Chevrolet had 70 ad agencies around the globe. Now Commonwealth will handle and supervise creative work worldwide out of Detroit for all markets except China, India and Uzbekistan, where GM has joint auto-making ventures. McCann will continue to handle ads in China and India, and Uzbekistan will be contracted as needed.
Much of the savings will come from cutting production of multiple ads for different markets around the world and instead adapting the same ads for different markets, Ewanick said. The company also will save money by hiring a single agency, Carat, to buy television time and other media across the globe.
GM hopes to take some of the savings to its bottom line, but it will use part of the money to strengthen marketing of Chevrolet, the company’s largest brand, Ewanick said. GM spends almost $4.5 billion a year on advertising worldwide for all of its brands.
Commonwealth won the business after GM reviewed the creative work on Chevrolet. The new agency will focus on “growing Chevrolet into a global iconic brand,” Ewanick said.
The new agency will bring about 280 jobs to Detroit from suburban and other agency locations.
Goodby, Silverstein is part of the Omnicom Group of ad agencies, while McCann Erickson is part of Interpublic Group.
The two groups often compete for the same advertising business, but will set that aside for the Chevrolet contract, said Jeff Goodby, co-chairman of Goodby, Silverstein, who will serve as creative chairman for Commonwealth. “We’re not going to think about that. We’re working for Chevrolet,” Goodby said.
The change is part of a watershed year for the century-old Chevrolet brand, Ewanick said. The brand sold 4.76 million vehicles globally last year and is on pace to top 5 million this year as it adds models in market segments where it had none, he said.
Monday Morning Quarterbacking: Agency Creatives Assess Super Bowl Commercials
Super Bowl LIX in New Orleans was a blowout win for the Philadelphia Eagles over the Kansas City Chiefs. So much for relying on a close game with the outcome hanging in the balance to help hold viewer interest through all four quarters. But we still have the commercials--and advertisers who paid a premium, some $8 million on average for a :30 time slot on Fox to reach a mega audience. Yet while the eyeballs were there, did the commercials as a whole do enough to merit and hold consumer attention while building brand and business? To put it all into context, SHOOT enlisted a cross-section of creative directors and savvy content makers on the agency side, steering clear of those who had a special interest or a particular axe to grind in assessing ad fare on the Big Game. SHOOT sounded out creative artisans whose agencies did not have any commercials on this year’s Super Bowl so as to get unvarnished, apolitical takes on the advertising. Here’s a sampling of the feedback we received: Michael Boychuk Michael Boychuk, founder, DNA&STONE, identified several favorite spots. “I liked the visual trippiness of Coffee mate and Tubi. They cashed in the check that the Super Bowl gives you to do something out of the ordinary and ran with it. In a room full of half-drunk fans watching a game with zero drama, heads were turned by the cowboy hat-shaped head and a bizarre dancing tongue. “On the other hand, I loved the authenticity and the powerful insight in the Dove “Hard Knocks” spot. My gut was that this was a year for a serious message to hit home, and for me, the Dove spot got the closest.” As for work that came up short, Boychuk said, “WeatherTech, Cirkul, and TurboTax all missed the mark. WeatherTech and Cirkul were... Read More