Multinational personal care company Beiersdorf has handed its regional PR account to Asda’a Burson-Marsteller following a competitive pitch.
The account covers the GCC, Levant and Egypt, with Asda’a Burson-Marsteller taking over from incumbent PR outfit TRACCS, which had held the account for the past five years. Beiersdorf’s brands include Nivea, Elastoplast and Labello.
Eight agencies were involved in the review, with three shortlisted, including TRACCS. Jean-Manuel Canga-Valles, Beiersdorf’s marketing director for the region, said: “We have had a PR agency for five years and really valued our PR partnership with them, but we felt it was time for us to go to pitch to see what other agencies were also offering. Our clear objective is to get closer to our consumers and we believe PR to be an important part of our marketing strategy. Therefore we wanted to strengthen our corporate and brand PR activity across the Middle East.”
He added: “Asda’a was the best in understanding our brand, understanding our objectives, and on clear strategies that would enable us to get the closest to our consumers.”
Beiersdorf is headquartered in Germany and has around 17,000 employees worldwide. Its sales in 2011 amounted to $7.5 billion. Regionally, its advertising is handled by Horizon Draftfcb, with media buying and planning through OMD.