By: David Gianatasio, Adweek
Grey celebrated its performance at the Cannes Lions in June with leather, whips and chains. The WPP Group agency hosted an S&M-themed “Fifty Shades” bash on the roof of the JW Marriott, high above the shimmering Mediterranean.
The party began late Thursday night and ended some time Friday morning. When word began spreading that Grey had won more than 100 Lions at the festival, “Every single person on that roof was screaming, hugging and losing their minds,” Grey worldwide creative chief Tor Myhren says.
The soiree was jammed with hundreds of revelers, filled well beyond capacity, and even Cannes CEO Philip Thomas was stuck downstairs, denied entry by the Marriott’s security detail. Thomas texted Myhren, begging the CCO to intercede so he could join the rowdy fun. “At that moment, it struck me how huge this night was,” says Myhren. “It was the night we put Grey’s global creative reputation on the map. Not just in New York or London, but every corner of the world.”
Grey’s impressive week saw the network win 113 Lions, triple its take from the previous year, and an agency record. The final tally: 21 gold (25 if you count its Innovation and Product Design trophies, two in each category), 36 silver and 48 bronze. The network’s efforts merited four Grand Prix statuettes: two for Volvo’s “LifePaint” and one each for Volvo’s “The Greatest Interception Ever” and SoundCloud’s “Berlin Wall of Sound.” While Grey’s WPP sibling Ogilvy & Mather won 10 more Lions overall, tops for the festival, it failed to score a single Grand Prix.
For Grey, perhaps the most significant aspect of the performance was the fact that offices in 18 countries scored across 20 diverse categories, including film, radio and outdoor, but also cutting-edge disciplines such as mobile and creative data. “No one at Grey, if the truth be known, thought that we would have a showing of that magnitude,” says Grey Group CEO Jim Heekin.
Grey also netted three gold Clio Awards: two for SoundCloud out of its Düsseldorf, Germany, office, and one for the Ministry of Tourism & Transport for the country of Ecuador from Maruri Grey. Counting silvers and bronzes, Grey offices secured a total of 12 Clios.
Ultimately, 2015 represented the culmination of Heekin’s decade-long quest—in tandem with Myhren, now in his second full year leading global creative—to transform the 98-year-old agency from an also-ran into an industry leader. This marks the second time in three years that Adweek has named Grey its Global Agency of the Year.
Along with its creative triumphs, Grey enjoyed a robust new-business performance across all regions this year, adding global assignments in high-profile pitches from Emirates Airline (Grey led a WPP team christened Team Air), Motorola and Pandora Jewelry.
Grey also expanded its relationship with several existing clients. Over the summer, the New York office leveraged its standing as lead agency for DirecTV to add a campaign touting the AT&T/DirecTV union, and was ultimately tapped to handle the new AT&T Entertainment division. Separately, the network picked up an estimated $200 million in business from longtime client Procter & Gamble when the company moved Gillette’s Venus, Braun and Art of Shaving assignments from BBDO. “That was a tremendous source of pride for the agency,” says Myhren. “For P&G to show that kind of faith in us [without a formal pitch]—that was huge.”
Other additions from new and existing accounts in various global offices included Vodafone, General Mills, Fidelity, Lego, Walmart, LendingTree and Walt Disney. There was just one notable defection: Olive Garden, which will be off the books in early 2016.
All told, Grey’s worldwide revenue rose 5 percent in 2015 to just over $800 million, no easy feat for a network its size. Digital revenue rose more than 20 percent compared to 2014.
Moving ahead, Grey vows to keep pushing to beat the competition into submission—creatively speaking, of course—at Cannes and beyond.
