15696: Unilever And Dove Cry, “Black Hair Matters!”

 

Advertising Age spotlighted the latest patronizing propaganda from Dove—and the report’s opening paragraph underscored the ignorance and hypocrisy:

 

“A new study from Unilever’s Dove has uncovered startling findings with respect to Black girls—from as early as the age of five, they experience hair-based discrimination at schools. That statistic comes to life in a heart-tugging new spot from Ogilvy and Swift.”

 

Okay, here’s a breakdown of the ignorance and hypocrisy.

 

First, why conduct a study to uncover common knowledge? Answer: Because Unilever and Dove are culturally clueless.

 

Second, why label the findings as “startling”? Answer: Because Unilever, Dove and Advertising Age are culturally clueless.

 

Third, why assign such a project to White advertising agency Ogilvy? Answer: Because Unilever and Dove are hypocritical piles of shit.

 

Fourth, why did White advertising agency Ogilvy partner with Swift? Answer: Because Unilever, Dove and Ogilvy (having abandoned OgilvyCulture long ago) are culturally clueless and hypocritical piles of shit.

 

Fifth, why does Swift boast about being female-founded and female-run with women comprising 80% of leadership, staffed by BIPOC-identifying workers comprising 40% of the team and certified by The 3% Movement? Answer: Because the Portland-based shop can leverage such data points to land gigs with Unilever, Dove and Ogilvy—plus, get promotional PR from Ad Age.

 

Sixth, this blog has been unimpressed by Dove since it launched the Real Beauty campaign—for reasons detailed in this 2005 post. If anyone needs further evidence that Dove’s campaign is thoroughly unoriginal, check this out. No, really, check this out now.

 

Finally, there’s no doubt that Unilever, Dove, Ogilvy and Swift will take full advantage of pumping the pathetic poop during Black History Month.

 

Dove Study Finds That Girls As Young As Five Experience Race-Based Hair Discrimination

 

Brand’s latest Crown Coalition effort includes emotional ad from Ogilvy and Swift following one girl’s disheartening hair journey

 

By Ann-Christine Diaz

 

A new study from Unilever’s Dove has uncovered startling findings with respect to Black girls—from as early as the age of five, they experience hair-based discrimination at schools. That statistic comes to life in a heart-tugging new spot from Ogilvy and Swift.

 

The ad follows one young woman’s hair journey through the years, opening on a scene of her as a girl. Her father lovingly spends time styling her hair in braids, only to see her turned away at school because her hairstyle doesn’t fit into the “strict hair policy.” In high school, her teacher cautions her against wearing braids during graduation, and as a young adult, she bolts out of a job interview when she sees that her bantu knots fall into the “banned” hairstyles at the company.

 

It ends on an uplifting note, however, with the young girl’s voiceover saying, “My dad always told me I should fight for my hair. So I am.”

 

The spot is the latest in Dove’s efforts supporting The Crown Coalition, the organization it established in 2019 alongside National Urban League, Color of Change and the Center of Western Law and Poverty in an effort to end race-based hair discrimination.

 

The new research, “Dove 2021 Crown Research Study for Girls,” found that 53% of Black mothers said their daughters experienced hair discrimination. Some of those experiences began as early as the age of five. The study also found that approximately 86% of Black teens who endured hair discrimination did so by the age of 12, while 100% of Black elementary school girls in majority-white schools who said they experienced hair bias said they did so by the age of 10.

 

Dove had co-founded The Crown Coalition following its previous research that uncovered how Black women are 1.5 times more likely to be sent home from work because of their hairstyles. It also found that Black women were 80% more likely to change their natural hair to “fit” into their workplace.

 

Since its founding, The Crown Coalition has been fighting to pass The Crown Act, local and federal legislation demanding protection against such discrimination at work and in schools. Currently, only 14 states (CA, CT, CO, DE, IL, MD, NE, NM, OR, NY, NJ, NV, VA, WA) and 34 municipalities have laws against race-based hair discrimination.

 

As part of its inclusive hair efforts, Dove also recently debuted its new “Hair Love” line of products. It was inspired by the Oscar-winning and Dove-backed short created by filmmaker Matthew Cherry, a Crown Act advocate.

 

“This new body of research illuminates the pervasive nature and deep impact hair discrimination has on Black girls highlighting the horrific multi-generational impact of narrow beauty standards in America,” said Esi Eggleston Bracey, EVP and chief operating officer Unilever North America, in a statement. “These biases continue to perpetuate unfair scrutiny and discrimination against Black women and girls for wearing hairstyles inherent to our culture. This is unacceptable and why it is imperative that everyone join the movement to make hair discrimination illegal nationwide through the passage of The Crown Act.”

 

Consumers can sign a petition and see more information on The Crown Act at Dove.com/Crown.

14607: Top Ten Things To Say About Diversity In Advertising.

Came across the AdWeak concept above presenting the Top Ten Things David Ogilvy Would Say If He Ran An Agency Today—which inspired the notion below: Top Ten Things David Ogilvy Would Say About Diversity If He Ran An Agency Today.

13504: Hidden Figures Of Diversity.

IBM professed its commitment to diversity via a campaign inspired by Hidden Figures—check out the videos here, here, here, here, here and here. Ogilvy & Mather created the messages. Wonder if OgilvyCulture led the charge. Whatever. IBM should ask the White advertising agency to reveal the hidden figures of its true racial and ethnic makeup.

13376: John Seifert’s Unconscious B.S.

Campaign interviewed Ogilvy Worldwide CEO—and ADCOLOR® Change Agent—John Seifert, who declared, “I want to be the most diverse and inclusive group of employees worldwide. More than 50% of our senior managers are going to be women. We’re going to have many more multicultural leaders who represent the world.” Wow, it’s amazing the old man’s statement wasn’t preceded by, “I have a dream…” After all, Seifert has been scratching his head over diversity for at least a decade, and even confessed in 2009 that the industry is “not exactly leading the way” in regards to creating inclusive workplaces. In 2011, he clumsily launched OgilvyCulture—which continues to be an oxymoron. And when he spouted, “We’re going to have many more multicultural leaders who represent the world,” it didn’t sound like U.S. minorities are part of the plan. Hell, his ADCOLOR® trophy might be the only accomplishment he has ever made in the area of diversity. So besides the diverted diversity pledge to promote more White women, Seifert’s grand vision for his White advertising agency sounds like, well, White lies.

Ogilvy & Mather veteran John Seifert takes charge amid refocus on heritage

John Seifert talks to Kate Magee about the future of the Ogilvy name and what it stands for in today’s ad industry.

In a world of portfolio careers, John Seifert is of that increasingly rare species: a loyal employee.

He joined Ogilvy & Mather as a summer intern in 1979. Now, 37 years later, he has taken centre stage as its worldwide chief executive and, as of this month, chairman after his predecessor, Miles Young, left to become warden at New College, Oxford.

Seifert will be the last person in the post who has worked with all previous eight chairmen of the company, including founder David Ogilvy.

So it is no surprise, then, that his vision is not one of radical change for the global network but more about ensuring it lives up to its heritage.

Seifert, though, concedes that building brands has become more challenging and requires a change in the way agencies operate.

“Every single one of our clients is asking for the same thing — make it easier to do business with you, make sure you have the talent and skills for the modern marketing world, and be quick,” he says. “Clients don’t want to pay us less, in truth — but they do want to pay us fairly for what value we create. We just have to be totally accountable for that.”

That will call for some internal changes at the network, one of which will include rationalising the number of O&M subsidiary brands.

“I think we have one brand and that’s Ogilvy. Over time, we have created lots of different entities that have Ogilvy in their name. But in a world that has got so complicated and so fragmented, I’m not sure that all those different entities signal to the market the brand promise of Ogilvy,” Seifert explains.

“We absolutely will focus on simplifying the offering. We’re still working on what the right brand naming is in the modern marketing world but I know it will be different from what it is today.”

The first casualty may have been Ogilvy Labs, the innovation facility that was closed in the summer. While the official argument was that innovative thinking was, and should continue to be, baked into all parts of the business, the demise of the division received some criticism.

Seifert stresses the changes do not mean the group will start taking a generalist view of the world — “we are not going to dumb things down” — but will make it easier for specialist staff to collaborate.

Other areas of focus include digital transformation and diversity — he has put both on the agenda for every management board at the company.

“I want to be the most diverse and inclusive group of employees worldwide,” Seifert asserts. “More than 50% of our senior managers are going to be women. We’re going to have many more multicultural leaders who represent the world.”

When asked what the timeline for these changes is, he replies: “I’ve had 37 years of training to be the CEO. We’re going to move fast.”

He adds: “One of our clients was saying at dinner last night, the consumer is changing faster than this client’s CEO feels that they are. And we feel clients are changing faster than we are. So we have to pick up the pace.”

Seifert has been at the helm of O&M’s North American operations since 2009 and was previously chairman of the company’s “global brand community” — a group of 25 clients worth more than £1bn in annual revenue. He has also led global brand teams for American Express, BP, DuPont and Siemens, among others. But it is these global relationships — and the “barons” who run them — that have been blamed in the past for impeding the growth of local agencies. O&M London, for one, is on its fourth chief executive in six years.

Seifert believes this to be a perceived problem rather than a real issue and that, while there is some “natural” tension between balancing local, regional and global work, this is not insurmountable.

“The London market is probably the most famous advertising market. It is a benchmark for the world. I remember living in Asia 25 years ago and everybody had the work of London on their reel and in their library because it set a standard that everyone admired,” Seifert says. “The role of London has shifted over time. It used to be this amazing domestic market of great creativity in marketing. Now it is a regional and global centre.”

But a great agency brand in London needs to be able to perform at a local, regional and global level, Seifert argues, adding that he has the right team in place to achieve this in London.

Like other countries, being able to perform on a global level is critical. “What I’ve said to everybody is it’s no longer good enough to be great in, say, Colombia or Argentina,” Seifert points out. “Now, you have to deliver a standard that the world admires. A big part of my agenda is to raise everybody up to a common standard of performance.”

Earlier this year, O&M became the Cannes Lions Network of the Year for the fifth consecutive time. The award has been a key measure of creative success for O&M in the past but Seifert hints that there might be less of a focus on this in the future.

“There’s a lot of debate around Cannes right now. It’s really expensive to send all the people that we would like to send there. There are more categories than most people even can name,” he says.

But he maintains that Cannes remains incredibly important as it has become the convening moment for adland: “So we have to be there, and be there in a compelling way. Whether we win Network of the Year again or not, I want to make sure we are doing work and are building brand cases that the whole world is envious of.

“I think creative success is defined by the work. The more work we can do to build our client’s brands, [the more successful we will be] at Cannes.”

Seifert’s overall goal for O&M is to ensure that it attracts the best global clients, has a diverse workforce and creates a strong portfolio of work. He says: “If we do those three things, I’ll be happy to go play golf.”

13085: NASCAR’s Slow Start.

MultiCultClassics wondered about NASCAR’s peculiar decision to award its advertising duties to Ogilvy, especially given the racing sport’s desire to lure a more diverse audience. After all, Ogilvy can’t even deal with diversity in its own offices. So it’s no surprise that the first NASCAR commercial from the White advertising agency presents a predominately Caucasian cast. Looks like OgilvyCulture wasn’t in the driver’s seat for this ride. Or maybe NASCAR’s goal to attract diverse fans really meant wooing White women. If that’s the case, the commercial is a rousing success.

12874: Playing Poker Or Solitaire…?

Advertising Age published a perspective by Reframe: The Brand Founder and Chairman Jeffrey Bowman, where the author attempts to rename “multiculturalism” as the “New Majority.” Um, the last time Bowman examined this specific topic, wasn’t he promoting the label of cross-cultural marketing while leading the segregated OgilvyCULTURE department? Whatever. Unfortunately, Bowman continues to clutter the conversation with fresh terms that no one really distinguishes from the stale terms—and no one really cares about. Hell, Bowman inadvertently underscores a key issue with his opening statements:

Let’s get a few of things out of the way. Yes, the advertising industry needs to hire more people of color. Yes, race relations are strained right now. Yes, immigration is a huge issue for the upcoming presidential campaign. And yes, Silicon Valley is still way too white. Do we all agree? Great. We’ve now all anted up in this particular game of poker.

The problem is, we do not all agree. The Current Majority on Madison Avenue—i.e., the confederacy of White folks—does not believe “the advertising industry needs to hire more people of color.” There is plenty of recurring evidence to support this fact. Plus, White people are holding all the cards in this “particular game of poker.”

As a result, Bowman’s “three big bets” likely won’t result in winning more credibility or crumbs.

How Brands and Agencies Can Win at Multiculturalism

Three Big Bets Companies Need to Place for New Majority Success

By Jeffrey Bowman

Let’s get a few of things out of the way. Yes, the advertising industry needs to hire more people of color. Yes, race relations are strained right now. Yes, immigration is a huge issue for the upcoming presidential campaign. And yes, Silicon Valley is still way too white. Do we all agree? Great. We’ve now all anted up in this particular game of poker.

None of this is news to brands and agencies. But something is changing fast—the complexion of America. The general market isn’t white anymore. In just a few years, the majority of people under 18 will be from minority populations. In a couple of decades, the majority of the nation will be minorities. And did you hear this? The millennial generation has come up with a new, better word for multiculturalism. They call it normal.

Winning this game is going to take a lot more than showing up and throwing a few pennies in the pot. Here are three big bets businesses need to place. Those that do will be guaranteed a winning hand.

1. Repudiate separate-but-equal marketing. Back in the 1960s, black-owned agencies were finally let into the club of major brand engagements. Now, Hispanic and Asian agencies are part of the mix, but the system is still a simple expansion of the 1960s quota system that first brought minority culture into advertising. We still have two “separate-but-equal” systems.

Procurement departments go out to secure external vendors and allocate a percentage of spend to what is called supplier-diversity programs. Internally, brands use diversity-and-inclusion initiatives to justify hiring and retaining diverse talent. That sounds good, but practically speaking, it’s just as flawed as the pre-Brown vs. Board of Education educational system was. As a result, brands are dramatically underinvesting in the fastest-growing parts of the marketplace. Nimble, authentic new brands are going to eat their lunch.

2. Change from the inside out. Today’s diversity-and-inclusion and supplier-diversity models falter in part because of the language used inside companies. Brands still speak of diversity as being an exercise in compliance. If they go beyond the strictures of the law, it’s a nice thing to do for society, but brands don’t yet act as if their future competitiveness depends on diversity—which it does.

The steady growth of diversity-and-inclusion and supplier-diversity systems has built up a large industry of training, education and organizational consulting. This industry is based on the belief that it is a civil right to have a diverse and inclusive work environment. The workplace that has been built adheres to that right and is compliant with the law. That’s table-stakes thinking again.

To succeed, companies need to drop the idea and nomenclature brought to them by compliance with external forces. Instead, brands need to see diversity as a crucial factor in being market-ready. In an era of unprecedented transparency and respect for authenticity, no company can fake diversity.

3. Put your money where your mouth is. Google recently created a new holding company called Alphabet, which got all kinds of press attention and anguished business hot-takes. In 2012, Walmart announced that 100% of its sales growth would come from multicultural segments. No one paid the slightest bit of attention. The former is a largely meaningless corporate reorganization, while the latter reflects a recognition of a massive cultural realignment by one of the world’s largest companies. Why no love for that?

Rebuilding companies from the inside-out to reflect the New Majority may not make the news yet, but it is going to shake up the way funds are allocated. Gone will be the days when, as I personally have experienced, shifting spending to the fast-growing Hispanic market means cutting marketing directed at blacks.

Once you place these bets, your brand or business will be open for New Majority customers. That means that, for the first time since the heyday of America’s white majority, your business will be ready to sell to every one of your potential customers. You will be targeting the real, total addressable market, not some artificial fraction thereof. And if you are among the first to figure this out, consumers and talent will seek you out.

Jeffrey Bowman is founder and chairman of Reframe: The Brand, a consulting firm that helps businesses prepare for the New Majority. Mr. Bowman was previously senior partner-managing director at Ogilvy & Mather New York.

12255: Coke’s Lily-White Christmas.

A new Coca-Cola holiday commercial from Ogilvy (apparently originally produced with Coca-Cola Germany) forgoes the polar bears for Santa Claus, Jimmy Durante and slice-of-life scenarios. However, it’s a predominately White Christmas, with only one background Black person and an ambiguous Asian/Latina character in the entire 60-second spot. Where the hell was OgilvyCulture while this contrived shit was being storyboarded?

12242: Singing For Scents.

Glade hired singer Kevin Ross to serenade holiday scented candles via a new spot from Ogilvy. Wonder if OgilvyCulture was called in to consult on—or even co-create—this contrived, clichéd and concept-free commercial.

11913: Cannes Invents New Clichés.

Cannes broke away from the clichéd convention of only spotlighting Black recording artists by featuring Astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson in an Ogilvy & Mather-sponsored lecture. It was probably an OgilvyCulture initiative. Look for the agency to turn the event into a Black inventors ad next February.

Neil deGrasse Tyson: We Must Celebrate Innovators or ‘Move Back Into the Cave’

Cannes creatives challenged to be part of the solution

By David Griner

CANNES, France—He is one of the world’s only household names in the field of science, but Neil deGrasse Tyson definitely wishes that weren’t the case.

Standing before an audience of global creatives today, the astrophysicist and host of Cosmos: A Spacetime Odyssey told Cannes Lions attendees that the world needs to return to the time when it valued great thinkers and honored them as national heroes.

Instead of showing slides of star maps or X-ray images of distant galaxies, Tyson chose to feature pictures of money in his appearance at the festival’s fourth annual Ogilvy & Mather Inspire lecture. He presented slide after slide of international currency that featured and honored scientists as cultural icons. Today, few such bills can be found, and Tyson fears the world is losing its admiration for science.

“Somebody cared enough about it to put it on the currency. These are the things that affect your culture. A whole culture can be given to problem solving simply by the forces operating within it and around it, forces you might not even be aware of while you’re in the middle of it.”

Instead, Tyson cited his home nation of the United States as a place where politicians, media and pop culture are often scientifically ignorant or even hostile.

To highlight how nations and cultures can lose their focus on science, he gave the example of the Islamic world around 1000 AD, “one of the most intellectually fertile periods in the history of the human species.”

“Mathematics, agriculture, engineering, medicine, navigation—all of that happened while Europe was disemboweling heretics at the same time. So what happened? Well, it wasn’t forever.”

The rise of one influential philosopher, Al-Ghazali, early in the 11th century popularized the idea that “manipulating numbers was outside your spiritual accountability.” The result, Tyson said, was a centuries-long evaporation of scientific emphasis in Muslim culture.

“If something falls, and you say, ‘Allah did that.’ If you’re content with that, you will not be the one who discovers gravity. If you’re content with everything you see as being the will of a divine force, you have been removed from the equation of all those whose curiosity leads to solutions to problems.”

Today, Tyson told the audience, the United States and many other nations are in danger of similarly losing their appreciation for “scientific creativity.” The solution he proposes is not just to be more respectful of science, but also to be more respectful of creativity.

Speaking to Adweek after the Cannes Lions session, Tyson said the stakes are incredibly high—up to and including our own species’ destruction.

“I’m an acute observer of trends in cultures, because some trends are away from innovation. And if it’s away from innovation and creativity, then problems you already know exist, and especially problems that you don’t know will yet arise, can be the unweaving of your civilization, and I don’t want to be in that world.”

Reversing the trend, he said, is partly the responsibility of marketers and media influencers, many of whom are in attendance here at the Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity.

We must return to celebrating those who combine creativity with science and discovery, Tyson said, or we risk falling into an intellectual tailspin that might prove irreversible.

“Their activities should be cherished These are the people we should hold up high. We should build statues to those people. We used to. Those are the folks who advance frontiers. The inventors, the explorers, the discoverers, the innovators,” Tyson said.

“These are the people who shape civilization. If you don’t cultivate and nurture that, you might as well just move back into the cave, because that’s where we’re going to end up without it.”

11414: Creating Cross-Cultural Confusion.

The New York Times reported on the latest attempt to make sense of cross-cultural marketing: the launch of the Cross Cultural Marketing and Communications Association. At first blush, the organization appears to be nothing more than the usual cross-cultural suspects—OgilvyCULTURE, Draftfcb and Millward Brown—officially hooking up in an attempt to build momentum behind their fuzzy agenda. At second blush, it’s just kinda pathetic.

For starters, the cross-cultural mouthpieces are saying absolutely nothing new—although it might sound new to the overwhelming majority of adpeople, most of whom never paid attention when cross-cultural fanatics began squawking in earnest back in 2011. The problem then is the same now; that is, the core message lacks clarity and focus. More importantly, there is no legitimate motivation for supporting the cause.

It doesn’t help that the cause is rooted in flawed thinking. The New York Times article spotlighted the erroneous rationales when stating, “Cross-cultural marketing tries to reach diverse consumer groups, addressing similarities rather than differences.” The statement seems to imply typical multicultural marketing deliberately tries to exploit or exaggerate differences. This is simply false. In fact, multicultural marketing ordinarily attempts to be synergistic with the mass-market efforts. And multicultural marketing, incidentally, often has greater crossover appeal to all segments than the mass-market stuff produced by White agencies.

The truth is, multicultural marketing originated from a basic advertising tenet: know your audience. In that respect, it shares primary objectives with the mass-market communications versus merely “addressing differences.”

But wait, there’s more. The fragmentation of media—accelerated by the digital revolution and globalization of markets—makes it silly to believe one campaign can cover everyone. The mass market is dead, killed by societal shifts and evolutions. Multicultural marketers have been saying it for years, and the rest of the advertising world is finally getting around to reading the autopsy report.

The New York Times article offered further bullshit via a quote from OgilvyCULTURE Honcho Jeffrey L. Bowman: “The industry says you have to be in the general market box or in the multicultural marketing box…Cross-cultural is inclusive of both boxes.” Huh? Sorry, Mr. Bowman, but let’s be honest. White agencies are to blame for the segregation in our industry. Clients too. Cross-cultural as defined by the Cross Cultural Marketing and Communications Association is what the White agencies should be doing if they are charged with reaching the mythical mass market. Unfortunately, what is dubbed “mass market” is shorthand for White. If cross-cultural is not happening today, it’s only because White agencies remain culturally clueless.

Cross-cultural arguably has little to do with multicultural marketing; rather, it exposes the major dilemma of exclusivity at White agencies. Indeed, OgilvyCULTURE and the cross-cultural components at Draftfcb are segregated silos. Bowman sings the praises of cross-cultural, yet he can’t even get his own office partners to join the chorus.

In short, cross-cultural clowns should not seek to distinguish themselves by criticizing multicultural marketing; rather, the judgments should be hurled at White agencies boasting mass-market expertise. For drones from OgilvyCULTURE or Draftfcb cross-cultural units, that would require confronting one’s bosses.

Draftfcb Executive Vice President and Chief Global Strategy Officer Vita Harris blurred matters by insisting cross-cultural demands agencies and advertisers must have their “fingers on the pulse of consumers…[and] a lot of that comes out of hiring people who reflect the consumer base.” So is cross-cultural a diversity initiative too? Talk about tying an albatross to the crusade.

It’s unclear what the Cross Cultural Marketing and Communications Association hopes to accomplish—just as it’s still unclear what OgilvyCULTURE is trying to do. However, the new organization is holding The Total Market Conference on September 9-10 in New York City. Look for a cross-cultural awards show, perhaps followed by a minority internship program, in the near future.

::

New Ad Organization to Promote Cross-Cultural Marketing

By Stuart Elliott

Five big names on Madison Avenue are joining forces to start an organization devoted to promoting what is known as cross-cultural marketing: pitches directed at a general market whose demographic makeup is becoming much more diverse.

The organization, called the Cross Cultural Marketing and Communications Association, is being started by the American Association of Advertising Agencies; Draftfcb, part of the Interpublic Group of Companies; PepsiCo; and two divisions of WPP, Ogilvy & Mather Worldwide and the Millward Brown research company.

The new association plans to introduce itself at the Total Market Industry Conference, which is set for Sept. 9 and 10 at the Ogilvy & Mather headquarters on the West Side of Manhattan. Speakers are to discuss subjects like demographic trends, how to engage new kinds of consumers, technological trends and how to attract and keep talented employees.

Cross-cultural marketing tries to reach diverse consumer groups, addressing similarities rather than differences. An example would be a recent commercial for Cheerios cereal, sold by General Mills, which featured an interracial family. That approach diverges from multicultural marketing, which is directed at specific demographic groups like Hispanics or African-Americans.

“The industry says you have to be in the general market box or in the multicultural marketing box,” said Jeffrey L. Bowman, the founder of the new organization. “Cross-cultural is inclusive of both boxes.”

Mr. Bowman’s day job is as the cross-cultural practice lead at Ogilvy & Mather, where he is also a managing director and senior partner. He has long advocated an approach that recognizes a “total market” rather than more narrowly focused marketing messages; before speaking to a reporter, he said this week, he had attended “a total market summit with Kimberly-Clark.”

The new association is “not a commercial for Ogilvy” or its cross-cultural practice, Mr. Bowman said. “We should think of the total market as a new revenue vertical for the industry.”

A member of the advisory board of the new association, Vita Harris, executive vice president and chief global strategy officer at Draftfcb, said one of its goals was “to start to ignite a community of people taking the total market seriously.”

A total market approach requires agencies and advertisers to have their “fingers on the pulse of consumers,” she added, and “a lot of that comes out of hiring people who reflect the consumer base” — that is, having a work force that is more diverse.

Ms. Harris and Mr. Bowman acknowledged that the new association joined a lengthy list of industry associations and organizations.

“We want to complement the other associations out there” rather than compete with them for attention and resources, Mr. Bowman said, adding: “If we’re successful, other organizations will adopt the total market approach. If we go away, great, it would mean we’ll have been successful.”

10996: OgilvyCULTURE Clichés.

OgilvyCULTURE—which continues to sound like an oxymoron—kicked off the year with the Cross-Cultural Roundtable starring Soledad O’Brien and a handful of alleged thought leaders who probably have little influence regarding integrating the advertising industry. First of all, as the photos here show, the event did not even feature a round table. Second, why were no advertising agency representatives participating? People outside of agencies—including clients—are painfully ignorant about the state of affairs on Madison Avenue. Third, why is Ogilvy’s logo all over the place? The shop is so proud to sponsor others having diversity discussions while failing to hold meaningful conversations on the topic in their own hallways. The roundish-table soiree regurgitated all the standard mumbo-jumbo about the imperative for multicultural and cross-cultural marketing. BTW, doesn’t the presence of a multicultural or cross-cultural unit essentially admit that the mainline practice is mono-cultural? Commenting on OgilvyCULTURE, Cross-Cultural Practice Lead Jeffrey L. Bowman stated, “Over the last two years, it has not always been an easy path but given the changing industry landscape, it is a necessary conversation. We have a lot of work ahead of us in 2013.” Yeah, but it probably won’t be work that receives the same attention and funding as the efforts of Bowman’s White counterparts across the hall.

10401: Lil Buck, Lil Concept.

Wonder if this Gap commercial and print ad are examples of the cross-cultural strategic solutions delivered by OgilvyCULTURE.

10381: Cool Cross-Cultural Conference Coming!

Oh boy! Ogilvy & Mather is holding its 2nd Annual Cross-Cultural Conference on October 22, 2012. The gala event will take place at “The Chocolate Factory,” 636 11th Avenue, New York, New York. According to the self-hype, “The 2012 conference promises to be a day filled with learnings, insights, sharing, and networking with cross-cultural thought leaders.” Gee, maybe the keynote speakers will include Tanner Colby. But don’t expect the “learnings” to feature results from the recent study conducted by Burrell. Additional self-hype claimed, “Over the past year, OgilvyCULTURE delivered cross-cultural strategic solutions for global brands within the retail, furniture, airline, energy, beverage, beauty and packaged goods categories”—which probably means the minority executives weren’t allowed to actually produce any work, handing over the “cross-cultural solutions” to their culturally clueless White associates.

10329: NASCAR Seeks Diversity Help Via Ogilvy…?!

Advertising Age reported NASCAR named Ogilvy as its new AOR, and the responsibilities will include helping the sport lure younger and more diverse fans. Wowee, sounds like the perfect opportunity for OgilvyCulture to practice its cross-cultural magic. Let’s just hope the NASCAR clients seeking to add diversity don’t look at the HR records of their new AOR, as Ogilvy North American Chairman John Seifert conceded the industry is “not exactly leading the way” in creating inclusive environments—and even admitted OgilvyCulture was a messy work-in-progress. So for NASCAR, it’s the colorblind leading the colorblind. Gentlemen, start your engines.

Ogilvy Named Agency of Record For Nascar

WPP Shop Tapped As Racing Sport Aims to Draw Younger, More Diverse Fans

By Rupal Parekh

After a four-month-long pitch, Nascar has chosen Ogilvy as its agency of record. The WPP agency will be responsible for helping Nascar launch a new brand platform at the Daytona 500’s 55th anniversary race in February 2013.

As Ad Age reported in March, Nascar began a review for a full-service ad firm to help it grow its young and multicultural audiences. Ogilvy will help execute a five-year plan by NASCAR that aims to reinvigorate existing fans and create new ones. It will also be tasked with media strategy, promotions and digital support.

In a sign of how hungry agencies continue to be for new business, Nascar was inundated with 110 inquiries to pitch its business from agencies of all different sizes and disciplines upon news of its agency review.

That list was eventually whittled down to ten finalists, and in late June Nascar visited three finalist shops—in addition to Ogilvy, Interpublic Group of Cos.’ McCann-Erickson and Publicis Groupe’s Leo Burnett were in the running—which presented to a group of senior execs, including Nascar Chairman-CEO Brian France.

Ogilvy’s presentations edged out the competition. “We were thoroughly impressed with the caliber of all three finalists; but Ogilvy’s consistency, creativity and dynamic leadership were the key differentiators,” said Kim Brink, Nascar managing director of brand, consumer and series marketing, said in a statement. “We’re delighted to join the agency’s roster of big consumer brands.”

Ms. Brink, who earlier in her career spent time at Cadillac, is understood to have initiated the review after arriving at Nascar last fall. Back in March, she told Ad Age that Nascar’s ad budget going forward would be “way north” of its measured media spending of around $25 million last year.

Said John Seifert, chairman-CEO of Ogilvy & Mather North America, in a statement: “From the beginning of the agency review process, it was clear to us that Nascar was looking for a true business partner. We firmly believe that Nascar is a valuable tool in the marketing mix and a place where big brands get high return on investment. We couldn’t be more proud to add the sport to our portfolio of global brands.”

Nascar races are broadcast in more than 150 countries and in 20 languages, and the group has offices in eight cities across North America.

9812: BHM 2012—Madison Avenue Ads.

If White advertising agencies produced self-promotional messages to celebrate Black History Month, the ads would probably look like these parodies.

9775: Gap & Ogilvy Be Very White.

About a year ago, the Gap named Ogilvy as its global agency of record. Here’s a new series of print ads for the retailer. Not sure why the Gap needed an agency to produce this shit. And why is everything so White? Perhaps OgilvyCulture wasn’t consulted on the campaign.