Advertising In Five

The daily five-minute brief on the advertising business.

Daily brief · 5 min
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The day's stories

01

Omnicom says IPG-related divestments near 60% complete

CFO Phil Angelastro puts the post-IPG asset sales close to 60% done, per AdNews — a signal of which units the largest holding company plans to keep.

AdNews reports Omnicom is well advanced in the asset divestments it planned after acquiring IPG, shedding businesses the company considers surplus in an effort to improve organic growth. CFO Phil Angelastro said close to 60% of the programme is complete, according to the report. The scope of the remaining sales has not been detailed publicly, so which specific units are still on the block remains unconfirmed. Agencies and clients tracking account and talent movement have been watching the divestment list for signals on where those shifts may land.

02

Coca-Cola campaign asks younger consumers to log off at meals

Marketing Dive reports Coca-Cola's "The World Will Wait" pairs an anti-screen-time message with an influencer roster, testing how brands run disconnect messaging through connected media.

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Coca-Cola's "The World Will Wait" campaign targets Gen Z and millennial consumers with a call to set devices aside during meals, according to Marketing Dive. The effort includes an influencer component in which partners ask audiences to unplug and focus on bonding moments over food. Marketing Dive does not detail the campaign's media weight or duration. The structure puts a disconnect-to-connect message in the hands of creators working on screen-based platforms.

Also moving today

Read the transcript
Welcome in, today is Wednesday, August fifth, and we begin with Omnicom, where AdNews reports the post-Interpublic sell-off is now most of the way done. Omnicom has sold close to sixty percent of the businesses it earmarked for disposal, representing between three and a half and three point six billion dollars in annual revenue, according to AdNews. That follows our earlier report on the advertising division's revenue decline during the Interpublic integration. Chief financial officer Phil Angelastro told analysts on the June quarter briefing that the company is satisfied with the progress made through the end of July, and that it remains on track to complete every remaining disposition by year-end, per that account. He put proceeds at one hundred sixty-eight million dollars through the end of June, with a further two hundred million plus expected from sales closed in July. Chief executive John Wren said the group had disposed of more than two billion dollars of assets in the first seven months of the year. Wren also said many of the companies identified for sale had been pulling down reported organic growth in prior quarters, which is the mechanism behind the raised full-year guidance of five percent. The same reporting says two assets remain under review, with no final decision on whether to keep them long-term, and Wren said that call would depend in part on what a buyer would pay. For agencies and clients tracking where accounts and talent land next, that shrinking list is the clearest available map of what the largest holding company intends to keep. Behind it sits a target of one and a half billion dollars in savings from the takeover, nine hundred million of that this year. The company says it is a little over halfway through that first tranche, per that reporting. Also today, Coca-Cola is asking Gen Z and millennial audiences to put the phone down at the table. Marketing Dive reports a new global integrated campaign, called The World Will Wait, spanning a pair of brand films, out-of-home and digital activations built around the shared meal. That same reporting says the work carries an influencer component, with partners asking people to unplug and embrace bonding moments over food. The interesting part for planners is less the message than the mechanics: a disconnect-to-connect brief carried, in part, by creators working in screen-native formats, with the unplugging ask sitting inside the feed it points away from. Industry reaction leans warmly favorable on craft and emotional payoff. A recurring counter-current questions the fit between the wholesome family-table framing and the product itself, and some in the trade note the awkwardness of a brand widely associated with packaging waste being the one telling the world to wait. A more contrarian read in the channel is that shared mealtime is a growing occasion rather than a fading one, which would put the campaign on a behavior already trending up rather than one it is trying to revive. Now, a few more headlines moving the trade today. AMZ Advisers has acquired TikTok Shop agency Reach Social Commerce, per the companies' announcement, with terms undisclosed and co-owner Jackie He staying on. Boise-based, employee-owned Drake Cooper has acquired Orange County agency Gigasavvy, the Orange County Business Journal reports, taking the independent to nearly one hundred full-time staff. And finally, Adweek reports Brandon Cooke, previously at FCB, has joined BarkleyOKRP as chief marketing and growth officer, succeeding longtime CMO Jason Parks.