When I was a mere Coglet, two of my formative clients were Kellogg\u2019s and VW. It would be hard to pick two better clients to grow up with.<\/p>\n
Kellogg brand managers back then were given a book on working with their advertising agencies, what was expected of them, their areas of responsibility and so on. The first sentence on the first page read something like this:<\/p>\n
\u2018It is not your job to change the advertising agency. It is your job to work with the agency, to get the most from the agency.\u2019 It went on to say that of course if it really came to it then it might be necessary to change the agency team, or elements of the team. But not the agency.<\/p>\n
Over time the agency grew to know more about its major clients\u2019 businesses than the average client. Within the agency sat a history that given the fact that even then the average tenure of a brand manager was around 2 years was valuable to the business.<\/p>\n
These thoughts have been prompted by the news last week that Audi is reviewing its creative agency, BBH for the first time in 37 years. That in itself is extraordinary for a number of reasons beautifully summarised by Dominic Mills here<\/a>.<\/p>\n Of course Audi and its parent VW Group is quite entitled to do whatever it thinks best for the business, but the Twitter howls from the ad community, including a call for all other agencies to refuse to pitch the business (yeah, that\u2019s going to happen\u2026), make the point that this is an example of a client simply not appreciating what great creative work can do over time.<\/p>\n Here\u2019s a client (it seems) being prepared to sacrifice such work on the altar of procurement.<\/p>\n