15th
Annual Edition 'Buying Power of
Black America' report breaks down billions in expenditures Black
consumers are responding to tighter economic condition by focusing more of
their spending on items and services that improve their homes and
lifestyle. That's one of the trends revealed in the 15th annual report,
"The Buying Power of Black America," published by Target Market News. The
report analyzes spending for black households in 2008 and finds that
African-Americans...
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Burger King extends consolidation of agency assignments to ethnic
accounts
By Stuart
Elliott
New York Times (August 17, 2010) Two months after consolidating some major
advertising assignments, the Burger King Corporation is paring its
agency roster again, this time affecting agencies that specialize in
marketing to African-American and Hispanic consumers.
The changes, to be announced on Tuesday afternoon, are indicative of a
trend that has accelerated as younger consumers, who are often less
likely to use traditional labels of race and ethnicity, have become more
of a force in the consumer marketplace. As a result, advertisers are
rethinking their decades-long approach of assigning duties for minority
markets to agencies that specialize in those markets.
Those shifts, by advertisers like Home Depot, have stirred spirited
discussion, however, as some shops that are owned by members of minority
groups call it ill-advised to remove them from agency rosters in favor
of general-market or mainstream agencies.
Burger King is making the changes "based on where our consumer is," Mike
Kappitt, chief marketing officer for North America, said in a phone
interview, particularly when considering "the X and Y generations" and
their beliefs in the "melting pot."
Consolidating the assignments will provide "a consistent voice," he
added, without overlooking minority consumers.
Leo Leon, vice president for marketing impact at the Burger King North
American operations, estimated that a third of the United States
population is composed of minority-group members.
"We felt the right decision for Burger King is to address all our
consumers as a whole," he added, "instead of taking a segmented
approach."
Burger King will consolidate the duties to create campaigns for adults,
whatever their ethnicity, at Crispin Porter & Bogusky in Miami and
Boulder, Colo., The agency, owned by MDC Partners, is responsible for
ads aimed at the general market and has also been creating most ads
aimed at black consumers.
The decision means that LatinWorks in Austin, Tex., will no longer
create campaigns for Burger King aimed at Hispanic consumers. And the
UniWorld Group in Brooklyn, N.Y., which has been creating some national
radio campaigns aimed at the African-American market, will relinquish
those duties as well.
Burger King will continue to run ads for Hispanics in Spanish as well as
English, Mr. Leon said, adding that Crispin Porter had already "helped
out a little" with the creation of ads in Spanish.
Although LatinWorks is losing its Burger King business, it was named
last week as the new Hispanic creative agency in the United States for
the Chevrolet division of General Motors.
Burger King is also consolidating the assignment for what is known as
field marketing, which involves sending agency representatives into
local and regional markets to help a company sell goods and products on
the grass-roots level.
The assignment, which had been divided between UniWorld and Wunderman,
part of the Young & Rubicam Brands division of WPP, will now be handled
solely by Wunderman. Most of the field team members at UniWorld who
currently work on the Burger King account who will be offered jobs at
Wunderman, the Burger King executives said.
Although the Burger King executives did not disclose the spending for
the assignments that are being shifted, they said that they planned to
increase the amount of money spent on ads aimed at black and Hispanic
consumers by more than 30 percent.
The last time Burger King trimmed its agency roster came in June, when
Burger King dismissed Campbell Mithun in Minneapolis, part of the
Interpublic Group of Companies, which had been handling ads aimed at
children and families. That assignment was consolidated at Pitch, an
agency in Culver City, Calif., that has been the promotions agency of
record for Burger King.
The changes in the Burger King agency line-up come after the hiring of a
new global chief marketing officer, Natalia Franco, who had worked at
Coca-Cola.
