Aloha from Portland. 80 degrees. Sunny. No humidity. That's your hard press to visit us here.
Anyhoo, during an Adweek agency team chat, the question of brand/agency tenures came up. Of course, some relationships have endured for quite some time—Wieden + Kennedy and Nike comes to mind. The reason we were asking about it was that, unbeknownst to us, Oklahoma City agency Ackerman McQueen has had a single client for almost 40 years: the National Rifle Association (NRA).
It appears, however, that this relationship is very much on the outs as the organization filed suit against the agency last month, claiming it had not complied with requests for financial records. The fight didn't stop there. Last week, the NRA sued the agency again, accusing them of leaking "unflattering information" to the press and engaging in a "conspiracy" to "tarnish and ultimately destroy the image of the NRA and its senior leadership" and engineer a "coup."
This week, Ackerman McQueen moved to terminate that contract.
"Today, faced with the NRA's many inexplicable actions that have constructively terminated the parties' Services Agreement, Ackerman McQueen decided it is time to stand up for the truth, and formally provide a Notice to Terminate its almost four-decade-long relationship with the National Rifle Association," read a statement from the agency's public relations division, Mercury Group.
"Over the last very difficult year, the NRA's chaos led us to lose faith in the organization's willingness to act on behalf of NRA's mission," it added.
The question follows: Is Ackerman truly firing its most lucrative client, or is the agency looking to exit before being pushed out? According to the NRA's tax filings, the gun group paid its partner $40 million in 2017.
Indeed, the scope and remit of the NRA have changed dramatically over the past few decades as it dove deeper into lobbying efforts and party politics, particularly with the NRATV content platform produced by the very same ad agency.
We don't want this to veer into a conversation about gun rights, sensible regulations (which should happen) and the Constitution—we'll leave that for the bloviating pundits on various news channels. You can also say what you want about an agency that has undeniably played a role in facilitating the acceleration of gun ownership in this country. But the bottom line is that some other shop will almost certainly need to pick up the slack … and hopefully they proceed cautiously.
On that note, gun control advocacy group Guns Down America took this opportunity to issue an "open letter" to top creative and PR shops including Droga5, Wieden + Kennedy, Edelman and Ketchum, asking them to pledge that they will never represent the NRA.
While this stunt may earn some media attention, we would note that many of the agencies on the list have led campaigns for similar gun control advocacy groups like the Brady Campaign and the Illinois Council Against Gun Violence. And few, if any, would welcome the public scrutiny sure to follow the NRA's next marketing partner.
In other news this week …
The Hertz/Accenture saga ain't over yet.
McCann settles with former global creative leader Jeremy Perrott.
The 4A’s has a new playbook to help manage safety risk.
Moving. Shaking. TBWA\Media Arts Lab has new creative leaders in Geoff Edwards and Chuck Monn. Sid Lee has a new U.S. CEO. Carat has elevated Michael Epstein (Adweek's Media Executive of the Year) to global CEO.
Hat tip to Grey Canada for a quietly powerful ad.
Wikipedia put Leo Burnett and North Face on the naughty step.
Talking some Schitt.
Love blooms unexpectedly on an ad set shoot.
As always, we invite you to visit our sister site, AgencySpy.
Before we end this little shindig, let's talk Cannes Lions. As mentioned before, I will be there. If you'd like to try to set up a meeting, please fill out this form.
Have a wonderful weekend, and we'll see you back here next week.
Warm Regards,
Doug Zanger
Senior Editor
Creativity + Agencies
