16089: Straight Outta Ulaanbaatar.

 

This Britto Visa Card promotional video shows that Mongolians love hip hop too.

 

13482: CMOs Want Whiteness…?

At Advertising Age’s Small Agency Diary, PJA Advertising & Marketing Executive VP-Planning Hugh Kennedy presented “Five Things CMOs Want in 2017.” Not on the list: Diversity—despite the faux concern from brands including PepsiCo, General Mills, HP and Visa. This is good news for PJA Advertising & Marketing, especially given the racial and ethnic makeup of its predominately White executive leadership.

13445: Diverted Diversity Donation Drive.

Campaign reported HP and Visa made diverted diversity donations to Free The Bid—the drive designed to detonate the dearth of director dames. For Diverted Diversity Defender and HP CMO Antonio Lucio, the contribution reflects the technology company’s bullshit bold demand for diversity and inclusion—starting with White women. Meanwhile, Visa SVP of North American Marketing Lara Balazs declared the following on the company blog:

Visa is thrilled to take the pledge to #FREETHEBID globally. We want to partner with like-minded agencies who value diversity and inclusion as much as we do…

Well, that would explain the cash donation from BBDO. But a search for “diversity and inclusion” at the White advertising agency’s website presented no results. In contrast, Visa and HP are pretty explicit in their online commitment to the cause. Yet both advertisers continue to team up with White advertising agencies where diversity is a dream deferred, delegated, diverted and denied.

Balazs also remarked, “Visa’s ‘Everywhere You Want to Be’ stands not only for acceptance of our product physically and digitally, but also acceptance of diversity and inclusion. [Participating in #FreeTheBid] is a way to not just talk about it, but walk the talk.”

Okay, but when will Visa and HP “walk the talk” and end the hypocrisy of partnering with ad shops that demonstrate acceptance of discrimination and exclusion?

HP and Visa ‘walk the talk,’ donate funds to #FreeTheBid

By Kathryn Luttner

Both brands back their promise to support female directors with funds to help the initiative grow globally.

When director Alma Har’el announced her #FreeTheBid initiative, challenging both agencies and brands to include at least one female director on triple bids, several agencies, brands and production companies signed on—but no one donated money. Today, HP and Visa become the first corporate sponsors of #FreeTheBid, pledging more than $100,000 to help the program grow globally.

HP CMO Antonio Lucio and Visa SVP of North American Marketing Lara Balazs made the financial support public today at the Women’s Entrepreneurship Day event at the United Nations. HP is donating $100,000 to the initiative. And Balazs declined to detail the amount of Visa’s contribution.

The financial support comes on the heels of both companies making public pledges to advance their diversity and inclusion efforts. In September, Lucio challenged HP’s ad and PR agencies to diversity their workplaces, and last month Visa Global CMO Lynne Biggar declared diversity and inclusion in the workplace a “strategic business imperative” in a blog post.

“We’re excited to implement this pledge globally, giving women a voice in advertising to the benefit of everyone, everywhere,” said Lucio. “Diversity is a business imperative, not just a moral one. We hope to inspire more brands and agencies to join us in this pledge and #FreeTheBid.”

Others putting money where their mouths are include agencies BBDO, Gyro, and Fred & Farid. Airbnb is also expected to make a monetary pledge next week, said a source. Although only a handful of companies have committed financially, the movement is growing. Nineteen agencies (including 72andSunny and Joan), five brands (HP, Visa, eBay, Coca-Cola and Nestle) and 13 production companies (such as Great Guns and Wondros) have taken the pledge to include more female directors in their bidding processes.

“Visa’s ‘Everywhere You Want to Be’ stands not only for acceptance of our product physically and digitally, but also acceptance of diversity and inclusion,” Visa’s Balazs said. Participating in #FreeTheBid “is a way to not just talk about it, but walk the talk.”

Until today, #FreeTheBid was solely financed by Har’el, with donations funneled through the nonprofit Women Make Movies. The funds provided by HP and Visa will be used to hire someone to run the #FreeTheBid website, which is currently maintained by Har’el and a friend. The two admit they can’t keep up with the “hundreds” of daily emails, so adding a full-time staffer is the first step in taking the initiative global. Har’el, whose work includes ads for Airbnb and Stella Artois, also wants to start a board of directors selected from #FreeTheBid-friendly ad agencies and brands to examine case studies that will back their actions with proven methodologies.

“We intend to continue growing as the No. 1 source for ad agencies and brands to discover female directors,” she said. “The more women are given a voice and an opportunity in advertising, the faster we can change how women are represented and turn them from an object to a subject.”

10534: Omnicom Shuffles Credit Card.

Advertising Age reported on the latest Corporate Cultural Collusion via Omnicom, this time involving the move of Visa from TBWA\Chiat\Day to BBDO. TBWA\Chiat\Day “won” the business in 2005, which was formerly being serviced by—surprise, surprise—BBDO. Plus, Visa Chief Marketing Officer Antonio Lucio spent time working for PepsiCo. The “victory” is good news for BBDO, as Procter & Gamble just announced the Gillette account is up for review. Look for TBWA\Chiat\Day to “win” that business. Or maybe Fathom Communications. Who the hell needs Michael Lee and Madam these days?

Visa Shifts Global Creative Duties Back to BBDO

Succeeds Omnicom Group Sibling TBWA as Lead Shop

By Rupal Parekh

Agencies often say that even sweeter than netting a new account is the ability to win one back. Omnicom Group’s BBDO has just done that with credit-card giant Visa, which dumped it in 2005 after a 20-year relationship.

The shift means that global lead creative duties will now move from Omnicom Group sibling TBWA to BBDO, though TBWA remains on the roster. No other agency assignments related to Visa’s global marketing are impacted by the shift.

The agencies couldn’t immediately be reached for a comment, but a Visa spokesperson had this to say in a statement: “Our decision to designate BBDO as lead creative agency reflects our desire to deliver seamless communication across all channels in all markets. TBWA has provided excellent support to Visa since 2006 and will continue to support our efforts in select international markets, working closely with BBDO and other agencies in our portfolio. We intend to build on the global success of our campaign, More People Go with Visa, and to use the strength of our brand to support the growth of electronic payments worldwide.”

When BBDO lost its domestic Visa responsibilities to TBWA in late 2005, it led to Visa USA retiring its iconic tagline of two decades, “It’s Everywhere You Want to Be.” That tag was replaced with one that was meant to communicate the brand’s ability to help consumers make everyday purchases: “Life Takes Visa,” which TBWA rolled out.

Then in 2009, Visa further cemented its relationship with TBWA, consolidating global creative and strategic marketing duties at the shop following a holding-company pitch for the business. Following that move, Visa rolled out its first comprehensive global ad campaign, “More People Go with Visa,” which is expected to continue.

The move in 2009—as well as the move back to BBDO now—were both led by Antonio Lucio, who has been Visa’s global CMO since 2007 and a marketer for nearly 30 years, having earlier spent time at PepsiCo, Kraft and Procter & Gamble. The timing of the agency change is surprising given TBWA’s work this summer on Visa’s Olympic campaign, “Go World,” which saw millions of fans engaging with the brand on social media to cheer on Olympic athletes.

Visa is among the top 100 largest advertisers in the world and in the U.S., according to Ad Age’s DataCenter. In the U.S. alone it spent $487 million on advertising last year, and the global figures are much larger considering its Olympics sponsorship. Visa has been the exclusive payment card sponsor for the Olympic Games since 1986 and its current sponsorship deal runs through 2020.

The Visa shift brings a welcome boost to BBDO this week, on the heels of the news that Procter & Gamble has begun a review of its Gillette North American account. It’s a massive and important piece of business that BBDO or its predecessors have handled for nearly 80 years.

It also marks the second time this year that BBDO has sprung back quickly with a win after some rough news. In May, Bank of America announced that it would shift brand advertising to a team at WPP, but within days of that loss, Hewlett Packard said it was consolidating its creative at BBDO.