McDonald’s has appointed Omnicom Group to handle its US ad account, uniting its creative and media under the same group.
The fast food giant has tasked Omnicom with creating a bespoke “agency of the future”, with access to “top talent” and “data at the core” of the proposition. Omnicom’s pitch was led by DDB North America chief executive Wendy Clark, a former CMO at Coca-Cola.
As a result of the appointment, McDonald’s – which spends an estimated $820m on paid media in the US – has ended a 35-year relationship with Leo Burnett, part of Publicis Groupe.
McDonald’s USA chief marketing officer Deborah Wahl said in a statement: “Part of building a better McDonald’s means not only making changes to our food and our restaurants but also how we conduct business and we’re excited to announce McDonald’s USA has selected Omnicom as our partner to create a new agency which is yet to be named, to build the agency of the future.
“In selecting this agency we will have access to top talent, technology and thinking with digital and data at the core. They are fast, fluid and flexible and poised to deliver the calibre and volume of storytelling needed to support our business today and into the future. This new model will, over the next few years, create great work at the speed of the marketplace at an efficient cost.”
Earlier this summer, McDonald’s recruited Ogilvy & Mather’s Colin Mitchell as its global vice president of brand.
Mitchell is responsible for the chain’s brand vision and positioning, as well as “impacting major pieces of the McDonald’s brand, including advertising, visual identity and packaging”, reporting to global chief marketing officer Silvia Lagnado.
