Does a rose by any other name smell as sweet?
Palmer Jarvis DDB is hoping it’ll smell sweeter. The agency has dispensed with the traditional "client services" model in favour of a "brand management" model in an effort to better integrate its various divisions and bring a more holistic approach to its clients’ brands.
Under the new structure, the brand management group will be responsible for developing the overall strategic platform for a client’s brand across all of the agency’s disciplines – including traditional advertising, online communications, database marketing, branding and design and youth marketing.
The brand management concept was initially tested in PJDDB’s Vancouver office and is now being introduced to the Toronto office. The concept will be rolled out to the agency’s offices in Winnipeg and Edmonton as needed.
Frank Palmer, the agency’s CEO, says such an approach is critical to ensuring that a brand’s strategy remains consistent across all disciplines.
He says the agency’s various units – including DDB Digital, DDB Response, DDB Karacters Design and KidThink – will continue to operate as they have been with their individual clients, but in cases where the strategy is conceived by the general advertising agency, the brand manager will have the last word on how it will be handled across all disciplines.
"If you can handle all their business and you can handle it with one smart person across all disciplines – that’s what they want you to do," says Palmer.
That may be so, but some industry watchers believe it isn’t a coincidence that PJDDB began restructuring about the same time that national creative director Chris Staples left the agency to start Rethink Communications with colleagues Ian Grais and Tom Shepansky.
One agency source who asked not to be identified says PJDDB needed to improve its service offering if it was going to stem the flow of clients to Rethink.
Another says Palmer had wanted to put the focus on brand management for some time, but couldn’t as long as Staples – a big believer in the pre-eminence of creative – was still there.
This is the second time that Palmer Jarvis has reinvented itself. Seven years ago, the agency – which had built its reputation as a retail shop – set out to become a creative powerhouse. Last year, it captured Strategy’s Agency of the Year award.
