While Interpublic Group of Companies has a formidable presence in the Chicago market–including media-management firms Newspaper Services of America and Initiative Media Worldwide–some of its ad agencies haven’t had much luck here.
For the third time in less than 20 years, an Interpublic agency–this time Lowe Lintas & Partners Chicago–is pulling up stakes, having lost the last portion of its prized Ameritech account, that being creative responsibility .
Lowe Lintas, previously known as Ammirati Lowe Lintas, had been operating in Chicago since only November 1997, after the agency’s Manhattan headquarters won Ameritech as a client. It shifted the business here, as the cornerstone account of the new office.
The operation was opened with huge expectations (with overly optimistic medium-range projections of annual billing of $300 million to $400 million), much like other outsiders who marched into the Chicago market. They quickly found out, though, that competing with the likes of Leo Burnett Co.; DDB; FCB; Euro RSCG Tatham; and J. Walter Thompson USA, just to mention a few of the biggies, can be very rugged.
Lowe Lintas’ exit is much quicker than the two other Interpublic agencies also shut down here–Manhattan-headquartered agency giant McCann-Erickson in 1982 shut down its Chicago office, a unit founded in 1924; and Clinton E. Frank Inc. in 1984. Frank was acquired in 1976 by Marschalk Campell-Ewald, a Detroit-based Interpublic agency now called Campbell-Ewald.
Minimal billing led to the folding of McCann and the Frank agency. Loss of Ameritech, an $85 million account and the primary source of revenues, led Lowe Lintas to close its doors at 142 E. Ontario St. The shutdown will be complete at the end of May.
Some 50 Lowe Lintas Chicago employees (down from 65 to 70 staffers) were told late Friday afternoon of the decision to fold, as reported in Saturday’s Tribune.
Commitment to any ad venture is one thing, resources are another, but behind any sustained effort is new business.
Lowe Lintas knocked on a lot of doors, but often came out as a bridesmaid, pitching such clients as FTD and FTD.com in Downers Grove, won by DDB Chicago, and Principal Financial Group in Des Moines, picked up by Publicis & Hal Riney Chicago.
FTD.com would have been a huge win. but Lowe Lintas, as well as Cramer-Krasselt Chicago, also a finalist, were “blown away by the creative of Needham (as DDB still is called),” sources say.
Lowe Lintas executives here and in New York knew the handwriting was on the wall for the Ameritech account when the client was acquired by SBC Communications in San Antonio.
The Ameritech business handled by Lowe Lintas is being moved to the GSD&M agency in Austin, Texas, which already does work for SBC.
Other Interpublic units here include headquarters and the Chicago office of direct-marketing agency DraftWorldwide; Jack Morton Co.; PR firm Golin/Harris International, and Torre Lazur, part of McCann-Erickson Worldwide’s McCann-Erickson World Health unit.
Illini `dukes’ it out? Pardon our Big 10 provincialism, but we think University of Illinois could beat Duke in the NCAA Eastern Regionals. That is, if the Illini can get past the first two rounds. When we broached this possibility to Roy Bostock, the Manhattan-based chairman of newly named B COM3, he responded, “Are you kidding?” Bostock, who was in Chicago for the renaming of BDM Inc., is a Duke trustee and an ardent fan of the Blue Devils. And for good reason, with all the stupendous success enjoyed by Duke in the NCAA. As reported here, Bostock, former CEO of MacManus Group, which merged with Leo Group here, was the single biggest equity holder (10 percent or more) of MacManus. For what it’s worth, here are the Laz Final Four picks: Michigan State, Ohio State, St. John’s and Temple, with the Spartans taking it all.
On the move: Cindy Nelson to a VP, account director at Frankel … Connie Falkenstein to senior VP of client services, TuckerKnapp, Schaumburg.
Strictly personal: Birthday greetings to Michael Soenen, 30 (FTD.com); Elmer Eckert, 83; James L. Coxworth, 46; Kimberly Ring, 36 (Y&R); Terri Silverstone, 51 (MTV); and Cari Dinneen Hoffer, 33.
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– The Chicago chapter-Business Marketing Association at a Monday luncheon hears Patrick Condon, president of Etelligence, TargetCom Inc.’s Internet marketing division, at Harry Caray’s Restaurant, 33 W. Kinzie St. For info, call (847) 256-3883.