[14] McCann Erickson's Downward Spiral

A lot has happened for Interpublic Group's McCann Erickson in the past few months and hardly any of it is good news. In the recent past McCann has lost two big accounts outright, two pending review and three prized individuals.

So what is going on? Let's start from the beginning of this recent spiral. Between August and September, McCann saw two executives exit the company, both big players on the Verizon account. Soon after, the president of the NY office, Thom Gruhler was reassigned to McCann Worldgroup and is rumored to be leaving in early Spring. Kristin Rooney, SVP and Group Managing Director, left McCann in Augst to join a start-up that has yet to be announced. Executive Creative Director George Dewey followed Rooney out the door in September to take over as Chief Marketing Officer at SpaceX, a space transport company based in Hawthorne, California. He had been around McCann for 16 years. Both individuals helped retain the Fios business after an intense review last year. Read more about their exit in Adweek's article Lead McCann Creative, Account Execs on Verizon Depart.

After the smoke settled from the departures and reassignments, McCann entered into a game of tug-of-war with a couple big accounts. In late October, ExxonMobil relieved McCann from its duties on lubricants/chemicals and gave the $50 million account to BBDO. Shortly after, Applebee's put its US Creative division up for review. McCann waved the white flag and declined participation in the $100 million dollar review. None of this good especially after losing Nescafe earlier this fall, an account said to be worth $500 million "if Nestle is in spending mode" according to an article on moreaboutadvertising.com.

Okay, both of these accounts are gone and McCann can't do anything about it anymore, but that's not all. Two more accounts have just recently gone into review as Lufthansa Air and Avis Budget Group will explore other options for advertising. McCann, being incumbents of each, will participate in both reviews hoping to not lose even more business.

The ad industry is a volatile one and McCann Erickson is quickly becoming an example of this notion. They still have accounts to hang on to including Xbox and Mastercard and will look to build a relationship with Ikea in the near future. Maybe they should have gone after the Bud Light account which is still up for grabs just a few months shy of the Super Bowl.