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Coca-Cola has asked its three European roster agencies to pitch for

the next phase of its branding campaign, marking the first time in

recent history that the European brand advertising will be created

locally rather than imported from the US.

Leo Burnett, McCann-Erickson and Publicis have been asked to present

work for the main Coca-Cola brand to succeed the ’enjoy’ branding

campaign. The work will run in a cluster of markets across Europe but

could also be adapted for other regions.

The review is being overseen by Charles Frenette, who joined as

executive vice-president for Europe and Eurasia two months ago. As part

of the rethink, Coca-Cola has awarded a place on its roster to Soul, the

Bartle Bogle Hegarty breakaway agency, which is also understood to be

competing for the European brief.

Soul, which only opened its doors for business this month, has been

hired to create a TV, press and radio branding campaign for the main

Coca-Cola brand to run in the UK in the next couple of months.

’This is all a result of Coke dumping its global resource and giving

more responsibility to the regions,’ said a senior source at one of the

pitching agencies. ’It will not be about advertising country by country

but by clusters of countries which are culturally similar.’

One of the possibilities that Coke is thought to be considering is

clumping together two or three markets into mini-regions. This could

involve separating Europe into three separate sections: Southern Europe,

Germany and the rest of Europe, including the UK, France and

Scandinavia.

Douglas Daft joined Coke as its president and chief operating officer at

the beginning of this year and quickly set about transforming the

company.

This involved lowering costs, stripping out ineffective layers of

management and taking a close look at its marketing strategy.

His first job was to devolve power from Coke’s Atlanta headquarters and

hand more decision-making to the regions, spelling a possible end to

global brand directors.

Andrew Coker, director of communications at Coca-Cola, confirmed that

Soul would be working with the company and that the European pitches are

taking place.

None of the partners from Soul was available for comment as ±±¾©Èü³µpk10

went to press.