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Our favourite ads this week: 

If you visited the cinema in the last few days, you may have been puzzled by a lavish unbranded teaser (top left) portraying dramatic intersecting fragments in the lives of a ragbag of gangsters, hookers, mercenaries and other low-lifes. A movie trailer? An ad? Puzzle no longer: the film is in fact the work of TBWA\London, and is designed to support the European launch of Sony's Playstation 3 console. (Although what precise connection it has to the gaming console is still mysterious - more details will be revealed on the dedicated website.)

In a very different style altogether, F/Nazca Saatchi & Saatchi of Brazil is responsible for this beautifully realised film (top right) for local mobile service Claro, in which a little girl captures the sounds of home on her mobile for... well, I won't spoil the pay-off. An excellent choice of backing track adds to the magic.

A return to full form for Levi's, whose latest "dangerous liaison" spot by Bartle Bogle Hegarty (above left) is a sexy romp through several decades of denim fashion, as a pair of lovers progressively undress through different ages of Levi's jeans from the early 1900s through the 1950s, 1960s, and so on. Nicely done.

Finally, we can't help but admire the cheek of Juan Isidro Casilla (above right), a prankster and self-publicist who rang Swiss newspaper SonntagsZeitung and, claiming to represent Gucci fragrances, booked this colour double page-spread, which he had produced himself, into a February edition of its colour magazine. He instructed the newspaper to send the bill (for the equivalent of $50,000) direct to Gucci, and the error was only discovered when Gucci sent the invoice back saying it had not booked the spread. None of this would probably ever have been made public were it not for another Swiss paper, Blick, which has gleefully exploited the situation to poke fun at its rival.

In the news this week: Advertisers & Media

Mergers and acquisitions yet again dominated the week's headlines. Imperial Tobacco launched an E11.5bn bid to acquire Franco-Spanish rival Altadis, itself formed in 1999 from the merger of Seita of France and Spain’s Tabacalera. Altadis rejected Imperial's offer, saying it is too low, but talks are continuing and a higher bid is expected. Other tobacco groups are watching the discussions carefully, and may also enter the fray. The 4th largest global tobacco group, Imperial's biggest cigarette brands are Lambert & Butler of the UK and West of Germany, and it also owns Drum and Golden Virginia loose tobacco and Rizla cigarette papers. Altadis, the global #5, controls the Gauloises and Fortuna cigarette brands, as well as Colt, Royale, Habanos and Amsterdamer. 

There is similar consolidation in the travel industry. In a deal which mirrors the acquisition last month of MyTravel by Thomas Cook, European tour giant TUI is to absorb UK package holiday operator First Choice. Under the terms of the proposed deal, TUI, owner of Thomson Holidays and other brands, will acquire a 51% holding in its British competitor, which will change its name to TUI Travel, although it will continue to operate the First Choice brand. The resulting business will remain the European #1 ahead of Thomas Cook.

UK banking group Barclays entered exclusive preliminary talks to acquire Dutch group ABN Amro, which is itself struggling to fend off activist investors calling for a full break-up. In addition to its main business in the Netherlands, ABN Amro has extensive interests in the US (where it owns the LaSalle Bank of Chicago), Italy and Brazil. If concluded the deal would be the biggest banking merger to-date in Europe.

More than 60m tins of cat and dog food across more than 50 brands including P&G's Iams, Wal-Mart's Ol' Roy and other leading supermarket products, were recalled in North America this week as a result of a health scare. Hundreds of animals fell ill and at least 13 have died from kidney failure after eating gravy-based meals produced by Menu Foods, the biggest North American manufacturer of private label or contract pet foods. The cause of the contamination is as yet unclear, but Menu Foods has come in for widespread criticism for its handling of the crisis. According to press coverage, the first cases were reported to the manufacturer in February, but the recall was not issued until three weeks later.

In the news this week: Agencies

It has been a good week for dirty laundry. Wal-Mart defended itself against a lawsuit brought by former marketing head Julie Roehm for unfair dismissal by releasing details of its case against her and her subordinate Sean Womack, also dismissed. (If you haven't been following this story, see here for background). Wal-Mart had previously refrained from making a formal statement of its reasons for the firing, but Roehm's lawsuit has prompted the retailer to reveal the content of personal emails which appear to show that the pair - both married - were conducting an illicit affair. In addition, while conducting Wal-Mart's $580m account review, they were also apparently involved in detailed secret negotiations with a senior executive at Draft FCB (who has himself left the company) to jump ship from the retail giant and work for the agency instead. That makes Roehm's subsequent appointment of Draft FCB as Wal-Mart's agency flawed at best. 

According to Wal-Mart, Roehm "misused the agency review process and engaged in travel paid for by Wal-Mart and for the ostensible purpose of furthering Wal-Mart's business interest, but for the actual purpose of spending personal time with Womack". The New York Times story is available online here, and Wal-Mart's full and explicitly detailed account of Roehm and Womack's behaviour is here. It makes uncomfortably compelling reading. Roehm continues to deny both the affair and the negotiations to join Draft FCB. Perhaps the greatest mystery in this whole affair seems to be why she has chosen to prolong with legal action this ever more damaging public battle with the world's biggest company. Whatever the legal outcome, it's hard to see how her once glittering career in marketing can easily recover from the latest allegations.

Meanwhile, the libel case brought by Sir Martin Sorrell against Marco Benatti, founder of Italian agency FullSix and the former WPP country manager for Italy, began in the High Court in London. The prosecution case claims that, following Benatti's dismissal from WPP he and a colleague at Fullsix orchestrated a vindictive email and blog campaign against Sorrell and local manager Daniela Weber, which included name-calling (references to "the mad dwarf and nympho schizo"), obscene animations, and allegations of financial impropriety. The prosecution went on to provide what it called "overwhelming forensic evidence" to show that the campaign originated with Benatti and Fullsix chief executive Marco Tinelli. The defence, however, described the prosecution's case as being like a "bowl of spaghetti Milanese", assembled from "jumbled" evidence, "superficially tasty in parts", but which "leads nowhere". The case, as they say, continues...

Singapore-based agency Batey Group is best-known for establishing the global profile of Singapore Airlines in the early 1970s with its "A Great Way To Fly" campaign. It has handled the account ever since, and Batey was itself later acquired by WPP. Now, however, the agency's future hangs in the balance. Singapore Airlines called a review of the account at the beginning of this year, and Batey was knocked out last week. 

The week's significant new account assignments or reviews: Boehringer Ingelheim appointed Cramer-Krasselt to handle creative for the over-the-counter formulation of Zantac in the US; MPG captured media duties for BBC television and media; Unilever moved global creative for Lipton tea out of JWT and into DDB; Hertz added BBDO New York to its US agency roster. Subscribers can access the full Adbrands Account Assignments database here. 

As always, please confirm your subscription to the free Adbrands Weekly Update if you haven't already done so by clicking here or on the link at the foot of this email. Thank you for your assistance! 


Simon Tesler
Publisher, Adbrands

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