Droga5

We’re rather enjoying this little back-and-forth between McGarryBowen and Droga5, the latter of which of course just “announced” this week that it lost its own holiday card business to the former. Well, as you can see from the Facebook pic above, the McGB camp is glad to welcome the Droga5 account to its ever-growing portfolio. Why don’t they just unite, call it McGarryDroga and get it over with.

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We couldn’t resist leaving you tonight with this pretty amusing “announcement” from Droga5, which states that McGarryBowen picked up the Droga5 holiday card account. Yes, in case you haven’t heard about it by now, this is the Drogas’ way of taking the piss a bit this holiday season and it’s a nice follow-up to last year’s full-page ad in the Australian that the agency took out to encourage the industry to have more fun. The “release” nicely captures the tone you’d see in any AdAge report regarding account wins and proves Droga5 has a sense of humor even after losing Bud Light to McGarryBowen.

Read it verbatim after the jump.

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It didn’t take long for Heineken USA to make up its mind as to who it was tapping next to serve as agency of record for its Amstel Light brew. After just a month-long review, Droga5 has been appointed as Amstel’s new AOL, effective immediately, and is now officially 2-for-2 this week having already picked up more business from Puma.

Regarding the decision, Amstel Light VP of marketing Colin Westcott-Pitt says, “We are confident that Droga5, an agency known for its bold creativity and unconventional campaigns, is the right partner to take Amstel Light to the next level during this pivotal moment for the brand. We have a unique opportunity to leverage recent improvements in brand health and our increased emphasis on innovation to bring Amstel Light back into the spotlight, and we’re excited to get started.”

No word on who else participated in the Amstel review.

A little over three years after joining forces with Puma, Droga5 has added more business from the brand in the form of its Teamsport unit, thus now making the agency the global AOR for the entire account. The appointment of Droga to Teamsport marks the end of Puma’s relationship on this account with Syrup (example of work here), which handled responsibilities for Teamsport strategy, creative direction and campaigns since the beginning of 2009.

Just don’t expect anything immediate from Droga5 for this specific new business, though, as Teamsport work from the agency isn’t expected to debut until the first quarter of 2013. In the meantime, the Drogas will be rolling out 2012 Olympics work beginning next month and starring Usain Bolt. Regarding the decision, Puma CMO Antonio Bertone says in a statement that it was time to “consolidate” brand efforts with “one strategic partner” as the brand looks beyond to the 2014 World Cup and even the 2016 Olympics.

We’ve been told that there was no review for Teamsport.

A week after its Sydney office posted an industry call-to-arms in an Aussie newspaper, Droga5 has announced that Sarah Thompson has been promoted from GM to president of the agency. Thompson joined Droga5 in 2008 from BBH, where she was head of account management.

With her move up the ladder, Thompson will allow creative chairman/agency namesake David Droga and CEO Andrew Essex to focus on other agency activities  including external opportunities, strategic partnerships and building transformative technologies. In a statement regarding Thompson, Essex says, “She has imposed her preternaturally calm but indisputable professionalism on this agency, and we are much better for it. It seemed long overdue to give her a title that actually meant something, and officially acknowledge her invaluable contribution.”

As Droga5 Sydney sees it, the ad game in 2010 wasn’t for the faint of heart. So, with a full-page ad in the Australian yesterday, Droga5 encouraged agencies worldwide to make their New Year’s resolution dedicated to having more fun.

True, the golden age of advertising depicted on Mad Men has seen its heyday, and there’s no sign of it coming back anytime soon. Perhaps inspired by Don Draper’s full-page fictional New York Times anti-smoking declaration on the show this past season, Droga5′s ad reads as an idealist’s credo for how those in the advertising business should view their work and, more importantly, themselves.

Instead of dissecting this word for word, we’ll let you decide whether or not this bold statement is just another clever marketing scheme, or if it’s a genuine call to arms. But, as the folks at Campaign Brief point out, this sort of thing doesn’t happen too often.

View a larger version of the ad after the jump or by clicking here.
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The decision engine from Microsoft we all know as Bing along with Droga5 are launching a multi-platform search experience and interactive game that’s tied to Jay-Z’s upcoming memoir, Decoded. If fans of the music mogul can step away from Google for a sec, they can now use Bing and decide how to find the very locations that inspired the Hova’s lyrics.

The online experience utilizes multiple facets of Bing, including Bing Maps and Bing Entertainment, to give fans full access to the stories behind Jay-Z’s songs. Over the course of a month, fans will come together as a community to compile Decoded online before it hits bookshelves.

Ads for Decoded have been placed on 600 unique traditional, nontraditional and digital advertising placements (comprised of pages from the book) in 15 cities around the world. As an added bonus, every participant will be entered into a contest for a grand prize that will send one fan to see Jay-Z and Coldplay at their Las Vegas concert on New Year’s Eve.

Decoded, which lands in stores November 16, is being released by Spiegel & Grau, an imprint of Random House Publishing Group.

More: Droga5 Moves Five

Call it a reunion of sorts as agency namesake David Droga announced that Mother London creative director Nik Studzinski is heading across the Atlantic to join Droga5′s New York office as co-ECD. Studzinski, who first met Droga when the former was head of art and the latter was ECD at Saatchi & Saatchi London, will take over on September 1 for Duncan Marshall, who headed Down Under a few months back to assume the ECD post at Droga5 Sydney.

Studzinski, who spent three years as CD at Mother, also served as an ECD at Publicis London for several years.

via Campaign Brief

More: “Droga5 Moves Five”

David Droga turned into a man of some thousand words recently and offered several talking points during a chat with WSJ Magazine EIC Tina Gaudoin. The Wall Street Journal offshoot gave us a sneak peek at their September issue in which the Droga5 chairman and mastermind behind efforts like Tap Project waxes philosophical about “change, charity and the consumer” when discussing the ad industry.

Among his nuggets, which he expounds fully here, are:

-”I secretly wish I had experienced advertising in the ‘Mad Men’ period.”

-”This is not survival of the fittest–it’s mutation of the species that is crucial for our industry.”

-”Your campaign shouldn’t just die the day you spend your last cent.”

-”Online is amazing, but it in itself is not a solution.”

-”95 percent of the stuff out there is rubbish.”

Droga’s goal according to the piece is to build “the most influential agency in the world,” but if that doesn’t work, the man can at least model the hell out of a Prada suit.

More: “Credit Where Credit is Due? Droga5 Vs. Poke New York”

Ah, it’s awards season. Let the scandals, dust-ups and hurt feelings begin! Sigh… Poke New York is a bit upset with Droga5. Over on the digital agency’s website, a post has appeared that reads:

“So, a while back we partnered with the awesome crew over at Droga5 to help them develop the Million, a project in conjunction with the New York City public school system that aims to ignite students’ interests in their studies by offering a free cell phone that’s fueled by merit-based achievements (grades, attendance, etc.).”

Who knew? The Million, which is great project, won an Andy last week, as well as the Richard T. O’Reilly Award (for Public Service Announcement. On the Andy’s entry form, Poke was listed as a production company and this is where the agency is taking issue, albeit very sweetly:

“It was a true partnership where POKE worked hand in hand with the fine folks at Droga to create a comprehensive digital and mobile strategy along with a full-term roll-out plan on how to take Million to the world.

Now, our sources say that Droga5 filed all the entry forms and Poke was never ask about how they wanted to be listed. Then again, (from what we know) Poke never interjected to make sure they got the accolades they felt were due. Here we go again… how much hand did the digital agency have in the strategy, as well as the execution of a campaign? Poke declined to comment. A message was left for Droga, but alas… this snafu over credit will just have to be piled atop the rest.

More: Cannes Is Kind Of Like A Game Of Bolita