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Our favourite ads this week: 

This week's most important new ad is probably Onslaught, Ogilvy Toronto's follow-up to the much-praised Dove Evolution viral film. The new ad doesn't quite have the technical wow factor of its Photoshop-manipulated predecessor, but its rapid-burst montage is very effective, playing successfully on the current furore over size-zero models (for example, last week's shock horror Nolita ads). 

As a born and bred inhabitant of this great country of England, I am shocked and appalled and very amused by Only In Australia, the new ad by Leo Burnett Australia for Diageo's local jewel, Bundaberg rum. Like most other things in Australia, Bundaberg is known primarily by its nickname, in this case "Bundy". (In fact, there are few people, places or things in Australia that don't also have a diminutive nickname that ends in either a "-y" or "-o" sound). Here the people of England (Pommies) bemoan the fact that they weren't born Australian (Aussie) so they could enjoy Bundy by the barbie on the, um, beachy.

BBDO's second string agency in Spain, Contrapunto, ended up as the country's most awarded creative shop last year. This stunning ad for the Metro de Madrid was one reason why. 

Finally, the first ever German ad to feature in the Ads of the Week spot: this extraordinary viral was produced for Renault's German sales and distribution network to emphasize the model range's safety features. It's an exquisitely choreographed motorised ballet-cum-demolition derby.

Sneak preview time. This weekend sees the launch of the latest ad from Fallon London for Sony Bravia digital televisions, the follow-up to Balls and Paint (both of which have previously featured in this space). The new ad, Play-Doh, was just as much of a challenge to create, using the services of 40 animators to create a full-size stop-motion animation on the streets of New York. Among other items, the ad features a herd of 189 brightly coloured Play-Doh rabbits. For a short behind the scenes featurette and other info see the Sony Bravia website here. The ad itself airs for the first time tomorrow night and will be in this space next week. 

In the news this past week: Advertisers & Media

Rock group Radiohead, whose contract with record label EMI expired three years ago after a series of hugely successful albums, announced a bold marketing strategy for their first new record since 2003, which they are distributing themselves. The 10-track album In Rainbows, released next week, will only be available as a digital download from the Radiohead website, and the band are giving buyers complete freedom to decide how much they are prepared to pay. This will be the biggest test to-date of a strongly-held belief by many musicians that fans will pay a fair price for downloads if they are given the ability to do so. Cynics on the other hand suspect that, although a hardcore of supporters, will be happy to do justice to this honour system, the majority of downloaders will be happy to snap up a no-price bargain. Hopefully Radiohead will in due course come clean on the results of the experiment. On the other hand, fans prepared to pay a fixed price of £40 will get not just the download next week but also a deluxe physical version of the album, with a large quantity of additional material and other extras. 

According to a reports this week in the Financial Times newspaper, Procter & Gamble has hired investment firm Blackstone to assist with the possible sale of several non-core brands including Duracell batteries, Pringles chips and Folgers coffee. Neither company was prepared to comment on the story, but such a move has been expected for some time. A sale could raise as much as $5bn for P&G. Duracell and Pringles both enjoy an extensive global footprint, and generate revenues well in excess of $1bn each. Folgers is also a $1bn brand, although its market is restricted to the US. 

General Motors released details of what could be a historic agreement with the United Auto Workers labour union to transfer the bulk of its huge pension and heathcare liability out of its own balance sheet and into an independent union-run trust fund. GM would establish the fund with a capital injection of just under $30bn, including a convertible bond which could in effect make the UAW the biggest single shareholder in GM, controlling around 17% of its equity. At the same time, the union has tentatively agreed to the introduction of a new two-tier wage structure, under which the hourly rate paid to non-production-line, often temporary, workers could be almost halved. Previously they were paid at the same rate as production-line crews. In return, GM guaranteed to maintain investment into its 16 existing US production facilities, and confirmed its production schedule for the next four years. UAW members are to vote on the proposal next week. The union is also involved in similar talks with the two other big Detroit manufacturers, Ford and Chrysler, although interested parties said that deals as wide-reaching as this one with GM are unlikely, because the manufacturers are unlikely to tie themselves down to a fixed future production guarantee.

In another, even more bitter labour dispute, the UK is today on the brink of a devastating postal strike that is likely to disrupt service for a full week. The first two-day strike begins today at noon, and will be followed by a second two-day strike starting Monday. As a result, letters posted today are unlikely to be delivered until Thursday next week. Among other issues, postal workers are complaining about Royal Mail's plans to replace its current final-salary pension scheme. 

Mobile handset giant Nokia announced its biggest purchase to-date, with a deal to acquire Navteq for $8.1bn. The US company is the leading provider of digital map information for GPS mobile navigation systems, and already supplies several other service providers including Nokia. To avoid a conflict of interest with its existing clients, Navteq will continue to operate as a standalone company, although it will be wholly owned by Nokia. Despite that, the shares of other Navteq clients, such as Garmin, fell sharply on news of the takeover. Among other acquisitions of note this week, the BBC expanded its commercial division with the acquisition of a controlling shareholding in Lonely Planet, the successful publisher of travel guides for more adventurous travellers; and Beiersdorf, the maker of Nivea, acquired leading Chinese haircare brand C-Bons.

UK-based satellite broadcaster Sky unveiled plans for a separate broadcast service which will operate independently of the main Sky pay-TV business. Available via a standard digital terrestrial aerial, the new service, to be known as Picnic, will offer broadband and telephony services as well as three Sky-branded channels, and a full range of other third-party free-to-air streams. Picnic's main competition is the existing Freeview consortium. Also this week, the UK's Competition Commission reached the conclusion that the 18% shareholding BSkyB acquired in commercial broadcaster ITV towards the end of 2006 does indeed restrict competition. The Commission is considering a number of possible recommendations, one of which would be to force Sky to sell some or all of its shares. It will make its final report in January 2008.

In a separate competition-related dispute, the merger between Sony Music and BMG Entertainment has been approved without condition for the second time in three years. The merger was originally approved in 2004. Two years later, following a legal challenge mounted by several independent record labels, a European judge ruled that the EU had made "manifest errors" in its consideration of the merger and that the entire application should be reinvestigated. After another year of work, involving what Europe's competition commissioner Nellie Kroes described as "one of the most thorough analyses of complex information ever undertaken by the commission in a merger procedure", the EU once again found no cause for any antitrust concerns. A big thank you from all European taxpayers to the judge who instituted such a colossal waste of additional time and energy.

Following the high-profile recalls issued by Mattel and others in recent weeks, US trade magazine BrandWeek reported on worrying new developments regarding Chinese-made products which contain unsafe substances. The promotional merchandise industry relies heavily on cheaply made goods which can be logo-branded and given away, and many of these items are sourced in China. According to BrandWeek's article, auto manufacturer Nissan recently ran a promotion in Japan whereby customers who took cars for a test drive were rewarded with a free promotional coffee mug bearing the company's logo. One such test-driver felt ill after drinking from the mug, and it was found to contain excessive amounts of lead. Apparently more than 140,000 such mugs were subsequently recalled although, BrandWeek said, Nissan couldn't be contacted for comment. Also, in the US last month, the State of California was forced to recall 300,000 promotional lunch boxes given out as part of a healthy living campaign because they too contain high levels of lead. 

In the news this past week: Agencies

Former CIA and Tempus founder Chris Ingram announced the closure of the main London office of his media communications consultancy Ingram. The company had struggled to establish a wide enough portfolio of clients, and attempts to sell or merge the business were unsuccessful. However, Ingram will maintain the company's New York and Hong Kong offices under the name IngramEnterprise. Ingram UK's managing partners Leslie Butterfield and Andy Tilley are to set up their own consultancies. Butterfield has taken several Ingram staff and clients to his new shop ButterfieldPartners. Andy Tilley is to revive the Unity brand name for his one-man consultancy.

This week's biggest media assignment was Carat's capture of global media for Mattel, previously handled mainly by MindShare. Worldwide billings are estimated at around $500m. MindShare is also defending a review of Unilever's substantial media account in India. Another WPP network, Mediaedge:CIA is defending a review of the Cadbury Schweppes Americas Beverages business, worth around $140m. In the UK, Campaign reports today that BT is to call a review of its local media. Planning is currently with Mediaedge:CIA; Starcom has broadcast and print buying; Zed Media has interactive. However, Mediaedge:CIA did pick up US media for Monster.com, previously handled by Deutsch. Kimberly-Clark appointed multicultural agency Cultura to its Hispanic marketing account; and Boost Mobile, the teen-oriented brand owned by Sprint Nextel, is calling a review of its creative account, held by Berlin Cameron.  For all other appointments, subscribers can access the full Adbrands Account Assignments database here. 

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Simon Tesler
Publisher, Adbrands