Cossette has won the creative business for the SickKids Foundation as its new brand agency of record after a competitive pitch, Lori Davison, VP of brand strategy and communications at SickKids, has confirmed.
The assignment covers all creative brand activity, including CRM and digital. In addition, OMD has been named the organization’s media agency of record, taking over the account from Mindshare.
“In both cases, we were inspired by the insights brought forward as well as their demonstration of passion for our cause,” Davison said in a statement. “This is an important milestone in our journey to the next campaign and with these exceptional partners in place we are poised to accomplish great things.”
Dave Lafond, president of Cossette, says the agency is happy to be part of the foundation’s 140-year legacy of helping children.
“We wanted to demonstrate not only our thinking [in the pitch], but we also wanted to show how passionate we were to go on this journey with them,” Lafond says. “What we got excited about is what they’ve been able to accomplish, which has been amazing, and how great of a fit that is with the agency. Thinking of all the stuff they’ve done from an innovation perspective recently really fits in with the path we’ve been on at Cossette.”
Lafond adds that the category as a whole is in need of fresh ideas and should be pushing its thinking in new directions, something it will do in collaboration SickKids so it can maintain the path it has been on.
“SickKids is such a blue-chip brand, they need our help more than ever. They have incredible ambitions so we want to give them new ideas and thinking so they can realize their full potential.”
Incumbent creative agency JWT declined to pitch for renewed business on the account, which it has worked on dating back to 2003. It was the agency originally responsible for the “SickKids” wordmark that’s still used, and created the organization’s original “Believe” campaign.
Its “Better Tomorrows” campaign, which saw it produce a new spot every day highlighting the work that happens at the hospital, has won it several awards, including at the recent D&AD Professional Awards and strategy‘s own AToMiC Awards. The campaign is also considered by many to be a contender at next month’s Cannes Lions festival. Cundari, another agency that’s worked on the account, also received numerous accolades for its “Pain Squad” app.
“J. Walter Thompson will always be a SickKids agency,” JWT Canada president and CEO Susan Kim-Kirkland said in an emailed statement to strategy. “However, as they embark on the next phase of their journey, we believe it is the right time to pass the torch to the next agency partner. We are so proud to have been a part of the SickKids story and wish them continued success in the future.”
Both new agency assignments are effective immediately.
With files from Josh Kolm and Sonya Fatah
Correction: An earlier version of this article indicated that JWT Canada has worked with SickKids since 2012, when in fact its work with the organization dates back to 2003. Strategy regrets the error.
