17430: Wendy’s + WPP Media = WTF.

Advertising Age reported Wendy’s handed its US media business to WPP Media after a closed review featuring WPP and Omnicom.

 

The scenario is so messed up, it’s difficult to deliver focused commentary. Hence, here’s the bullshit excreted with random bullet points:

 

• A closed review between WPP and Omnicom underscores the exclusive arena created by White holding companies. How was Omnicom even a contender, given its deep ties to Mickey D’s? Perhaps Omnicom promised to erect firewalls separating legacy Omnicom and IPG enterprises. Regardless, it all shows major accounts will be divvied up between a cabal of predominately Caucasian corporations.

 

• Wendy’s creative business has been handled for over 14 years by VML, a White advertising agency within the WPP Creative confederacy. The client claims the media assignment simplifies marketing efforts via an integrated model. On the flipside, Wendy’s admits sales suck and brand performance has steadily declined in recent years. In most cases, such results would rightly prompt a full account review. Yet WPP was rewarded for incompetence with added Wendy’s business.

 

• Ad Age positioned the win as evidence of WPP CEO Cindy Rose’s direct involvement on pitches. Okay, except as detailed above, this scheme really wasn’t a pitch. Additionally, WPP Media was invented by ex-WPP CEO Mark Read. So, it appears Rose is simply riding Read’s coattails, which were torn, tattered, and disintegrating rags.

 

• Wendy’s US CMO has been with the fast feeder for nearly 15 years; however, she was elevated to the role only three years ago. Most of her former professional personas involved serving as a financial analyst. Ad Age previously stated WPP victories under Rose leveraged low-balling maneuvers and price-cutting incentives. Need an explanation for Wendy’s decision to hire WPP Media? Do the math.

 

• In the end, it looks like Wendy’s ultimately chose the least stinky pile of dung.

 

Wendy’s is adding media to WPP’s remit—behind the decision

 

By Jon Springer and Ewan Larkin

 

Wendy’s has awarded its U.S. media business to WPP Media in a move it says will accelerate an ongoing turnaround and build on its longtime creative relationship with WPP’s VML.

 

The restaurant chain had long worked with Publicis Groupe’s Spark Foundry. That agency declined an invitation to defend and declined to comment. WPP and Omnicom participated in the closed review, said Lindsay Radkoski, Wendy’s U.S. chief marketing officer.

 

Wendy’s spent $319 million on measured media in 2025, down from $520 million in 2024, according to MediaRadar.

 

The shift comes as Wendy’s looks to reverse disappointing results, including U.S. same-restaurant sales that fell 5.2% last year, including an 11.3% plunge in the fourth quarter. To that end, the brand is rethinking how its marketing operates. It is moving away from siloed creative and media teams toward a more integrated model designed to speed up execution, reduce inefficiencies and better connect campaigns to sales, Radkoski said.

 

“Our business performance has not been where we want it to be. It’s not where the category’s been,” Radkoski said. She added that the review also reflects broader changes in how brands connect with consumers. “I really believe that the days are gone of the historical creative and media silos,” she said.

 

The brand and media agency are already cooperating in ways that are faster and more seamless than before. During this year’s March Madness college basketball tournament, Wendy’s was signing athletes to NIL deals in near real time as standout plays unfolded, turning them into social advocates for the brand. The brand is a longtime March Madness sponsor.

 

“In the past, who signs the influencer [the media agency or creative agency] led to some duplication and not being as efficient in the work as we need to be,” Radkoski said.

 

Tactics like this will help Wendy’s respond faster and produce more in-the-moment content that will change the way its social accounts feel, Radkoski said. The brand also plans to lean more into product-focused marketing and ongoing campaign storytelling.

 

Wendy’s longstanding creative relationship with VML

 

Although creative agencies are often in the crosshairs when brands attempt a turnaround, VML, Wendy’s creative partner of 14 years, isn’t going anywhere.

 

“We’re happy with that partnership,” Radkoski said. “Like any relationship, you have to have big conversations about how’s the team, how’s the business, how’s the talent, how’s our operating model, what do we need to adjust … We’re in a really healthy rhythm with the VML team.”

 

Bringing creative and media into the same ecosystem will help Wendy’s “build around VML,” Radkoski added.

 

WPP pitched a model in which Wendy’s retains control of its data through a private network, rather than relying on agency-owned data platforms, said Brian Lesser, CEO of WPP Media. The multiyear deal includes an outcomes-based component, linking a portion of WPP’s compensation to business results, he added.

 

Wendy’s is the second largest U.S. burger chain by sales but remains well behind McDonald’s and has struggled in recent years. Its CEO, Kirk Tanner, departed in July after just 18 months on the job to take the CEO job at Hershey Co. Ken Cook, Wendy’s chief financial officer, has served as interim CEO since.

 

In October, Wendy’s launched a comprehensive turnaround program called “Project Fresh” aimed at modernizing how consumers experience the brand. As part of that program it retained Creed UnCo, a consultancy led by former Taco Bell CEO Greg Creed, to sharpen how the brand targets customers.

 

Wendy’s marks another major media win for WPP under new CEO Cindy Rose, who took the reins Sept. 1. WPP has been battling declining revenue and a string of client losses as it works through a multiyear turnaround plan. But the company has recently shown signs of life in the pitch room, notching assignments with Jaguar Land Rover, The Estée Lauder Cos., SC Johnson, the U.K. government and Henkel.

 

Key to this momentum, as Ad Age previously reported, has been Rose’s increased presence in reviews, as well as a newfound sense of humility and selectivity. WPP still has a ways to go to right the ship, but a win with Wendy’s in the U.S.—where marketing consultants have said the agency group’s perception hasn’t fully recovered following years of internal reorganizations—is the kind of proof point it needs to start winning back advertiser confidence.

17429: SMH—American Crew Cuts Gray.

MediaPost spotlighted a new American Crew campaign for its Undetectable hair color product utilizing the tagline: Fly Under The Graydar.

 

Gray shaming is ageist, no?

 

This concept apparently flew under—or over—the cultural competence radar, going undetected by the responsible creative team.

 

Gray Ban: American Crew ‘Flys Under The Graydar’

 

By Fern Siegel

 

American Crew wants to eliminate gray hair.

 

That’s the premise behind its Undetectable, a product promoted with “Fly Under the Graydar” campaign, produced in-house. 

 

The campaign rolls out across digital, social and influencer channels this month. Additional creative is planned throughout the year.

 

The company is a big proponent of men’s grooming looking effortless. Because gray hair is easy to spot, the creative posits believable color as an essential standard, even as it pinpoints all the signs of obvious dye jobs.

 

Designed to blend seamlessly with existing grays, Undetectable hair color targets gray hairs and blends them with men’s natural hair color in five minutes.

 

Johnny Kazlausky, global marketing manager of American Crew, told Out To Launch: “Graydar was built on one simple truth — men don’t mind coloring their hair, they mind it being obvious. That tension has held the category back for years. So instead of focusing on coverage, we flipped the idea entirely. We created it as a cultural wink — this imagined radar for bad dye jobs — that everyone instinctively understands. In our world, the win isn’t being noticed, it’s flying under the Graydar.”

 

Undetectable Hair Color is available on Amazon Target and most major retailers. It’s also distributed in more than 30,000 salons, barbershops and authorized sellers in 50 countries.

17428: Celebrating Easter Monday.

From Toronto, Canada, a vintage advertisement celebrating Easter at Aunt Jemima’s Kitchen.

17427: Yo, Dawg.

Does Simparica Trio think dogs love hip hop too?

17426: Easter Campaign Created By Bad Eggs…?

 

This Climate Basecamp campaign from M+C Saatchi Group UK is explained as follows:

 

Climate Basecamp, the campaigning organisation co-founded by Professor Gail Whiteman, Rainn Wilson, Steve Walls and Chuck Tatham, has launched ‘The Taste of Climate Change’, a new Easter campaign created with M+C Saatchi Group UK that uses a chocolate egg to bring the impact of climate change closer to home.

 

Timed to coincide with Easter, the campaign reimagines one of the season’s most familiar products to highlight how climate change is already affecting everyday foods people love, focusing on chocolate as a clear and accessible example. It forms part of Climate Basecamp’s broader ‘Save the Flavors’ narrative, which was piloted in the US by Climate Basecamp in 2023, highlighting how the foods and tastes people enjoy today are at risk as climate conditions continue to change.

 

The campaign is designed to raise awareness among the “moveable middle” — people who are aware of climate change but not actively engaged with it — using a tone that is accessible and engaging rather than alarmist. It aims to spark curiosity and conversation, encouraging audiences to reconsider the everyday impact of climate change and prompting light-touch actions such as sharing content and discussing the issue.

 

The push is inspired by the insight that many people have noticed changes in chocolate, from rising prices to shifts in size and taste, but few connect this to the impact of climate change on cocoa production.

 

To bring this to life, the campaign centres on a deliberately unpleasant chocolate Easter egg designed to represent the factors damaging cocoa production and the climate more widely. The egg is fully edible but intentionally tastes of petrol, acting as a representation of what’s ruining chocolate: climate change.

 

The idea uses humour and contrast to deliver its message, subverting expectations by turning something typically associated with enjoyment into an uncomfortable experience. Influencers and media are invited to taste the chocolate on camera, showing real-time reactions and discovering for themselves how climate change is driving chocolate’s current decline.

 

This approach taps into a familiar social content format, creating a highly visual, reaction-led campaign designed to work across social platforms and broadcast PR. The experience culminates in a simple message: if we don’t collectively act on climate change, we’re likely to continue to see chocolate get more expensive, smaller and less tasty, or even start to disappear completely.

 

The campaign is running in the UK across influencer activity and earned media, with content captured and shared over the Easter period.

 

Remember when competent creatives recognized if a big idea couldn’t be presented in a sentence or two, it probably wasn’t a big idea?

 

The Climate Crunch concept leaves a bad taste in everybody’s mouth.

 

17425: TGIF—Good Friday Edition.

 

17424: Delayed WTF 67—Holding Company Of The Year Award Is Totally BS.

 

MultiCultClassics is often occupied with real work. As a result, a handful of events occur without the expected blog commentary. This limited series—Delayed WTF—seeks to make belated amends for the absence of malice.

 

A previous post noted WPP was named White Holding Company of the Year at Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity in 2025, receiving the title for the second consecutive year.

 

As noted in another previous post, winning the award is based on a point system adding up the number of trophies and shortlisted entries nabbed by corporations—meaning the top White holding companies dominate an exclusive competitive field by virtue of sheer volume.

 

The honor poses questions in 2026, underscoring the absolute stupidity of the trophy.

 

If WPP scores a threepeat, will the White holding company decline to accept? After all, WPP CEO Cindy Rose declared the enterprise is no longer a holding company, but rather, a single operating company.

 

If IPG wins, will it be disqualified since the company no longer exists?

 

If Omnicom wins, will it be asterisked if the victory is a result of acquiring IPG?

 

If Dentsu wins, will Jerry Della Femina and President Donald J. Trump make racist jokes?