Impact of Coca-Cola's Large-scale Agency Reviews on the Beverage Industry
In a significant move for the advertising industry, Coca-Cola has chosen WPP, the world's largest advertising holding company, as its global marketing partner, with the exception of a few select markets in Asia. This decision marks a shift in Coca-Cola's media business and will see WPP leading strategic partners on creative tasks, as well as managing media buying in most of Coca-Cola's markets.
The creative work for Coca-Cola's marketing will be led by WPP in collaboration with strategic partners like McCann, Mercado, and Leo Burnett. This multi-agency model allows Coca-Cola to harness diverse creative expertise from multiple agency groups globally, ensuring that creativity and campaign execution match regional needs and brand strategy.
WPP's responsibilities extend to working with these strategic partners, utilising WPP Open X’s end-to-end capabilities in creative, media, data, and marketing technology to create a more integrated and future-ready marketing approach. The renewed partnership reflects Coca-Cola’s confidence in WPP’s ability to drive significant value and innovate in marketing across its global portfolio.
Notably, North American media has been moved to Publicis Groupe, while Dentsu acts as a complementary media partner in select Asian markets. This strategic move aims to future-proof Coca-Cola’s marketing while maintaining flexibility by retaining selective market-specific partnerships.
The announcement of this partnership between Coca-Cola and WPP has been met with interest and anticipation in the industry. Coca-Cola spent 11 months reviewing its global marketing before making this decision, indicating the importance placed on finding the right partner to drive its marketing strategy.
However, the announcement has left some questions about Coca-Cola’s global marketing review unanswered, with the specifics of the partnership in the excluded Asian markets yet to be disclosed. Despite this, the partnership between Coca-Cola and WPP is a notable development in the advertising industry, and it will be interesting to see how this collaboration unfolds in the coming months.
Sources: [1] AdAge, "Coca-Cola Taps WPP for Global Media Buying, Excluding Some Asian Markets", 2022.
WPP's collaborative efforts with agencies like McCann, Mercado, and Leo Burnett will extend to the creative aspect of Coca-Cola's business in the finance domain, aiming to generate innovative marketing approaches in the industry. The streamlined partnership between WPP and Coca-Cola, spanning most markets, is expected to redefine business strategies and foster growth in the advertising and finance sectors.
