Carat has emerged triumphant in the three-month pitch for the
Diageo centralised media business, defeating MindShare in the final
stage of the review.
Carat was told it had won the pounds 60 million business at the end of
last week, and will take on the full implementational planning and
buying account from 1 January 1999. The Carat project team on the pitch
was led by Colin Mills, its client services director.
Diageo, which was formed when Guinness merged with Grand Metropolitan
last year, originally invited Carat, MindShare and Zenith Media to pitch
for the business back in August. The three agencies were incumbents on
the Diageo media roster.
Zenith handled the pounds 13 million Burger King business, but decided
to withdraw from the Diageo pitch before the final hurdle after deciding
that the business would clash with its Carlsberg Tetley account.
MindShare was the incumbent on the pounds 18 million Guinness GB
business while Carat had Pillsbury and Guinness in Ireland. Carat also
picked up the pounds 30 million centralised UDV account earlier this
year after the spirits division was created out of the merger of
GrandMet’s IDV and Guinness’s United Distillers (Campaign, 24 July).
Having initially stalled on a full centralisation, Diageo then decided
that there were real advantages in pooling all the business.
A Diageo spokesman said: ’It makes sense for the four divisions of
Diageo to be in a position to share the best practice in areas such as
media.
We have been pleased with the performance of our incumbent agencies but
we believe that Carat is the best option as we move the business
forward.’
Mark Craze, Carat’s managing director, said he was delighted at the win,
adding: ’It’s brilliant to be working with four such world-class
brands.’
