Paul Simons writes .. When I saw the news Tesco had appointed Wieden & Kennedy to handle their £110m ad account my first reaction was ‘interesting and surprising decision’.
The smart money would have been on Tesco hiring one of the big players and not an agency renowned for its outstanding creative output – Honda, Nike, etc. The reason being: the day-to-day work for any big retailer is fast-turnaround, tactical advertising; which is not in the DNA of W&K.
Then I read Tesco have also hired TAG and it all fell into place.
For those of you who are not aware of TAG, a bit of background. TAG began life as a production supplier to agencies for print work and they have morphed in to a high-tech provider of agency services. More importantly, they deal also directly with major advertisers such as RBS, Citibank, Absolut, Sony and Land Rover. TAG were probably the first ad agency production supplier to cross the divide and work directly with serious advertisers.
Paul Simons
Paul joined Cadbury-Schweppes in brand management and then moved to United Biscuits. He switched to advertising in his late 20s, at Cogent Elliott and then Gold Greenlees Trott. He founded Simons Palmer Denton Clemmow & Johnson in the late 80s, one of the leading creative agencies of the 90s.
Simons Palmer then merged with TBWA to create a top ten agency. Paul then joined O&M as chairman & CEO of the UK group. After three years he left to create a new AIM-quoted advertising group Cagney Plc. He is now a consultant to a number of client companies. Paul also shares his thoughts on his blog. Visit Paul Simons Blog.