New procurement brooms at Tesco in shock decision to review TAG ad production deal

It’s all change at Tesco these days and now the supermarket giant has decided to review the ad production deal it struck with Williams Lea-owned TAG less than a year after it appointed the production company to work alongside new creative agency Wieden+Kennedy.

The move has surprised TAG, which hired a number of people from Tesco’s former creative agency The Red Brick Road when it won the business last year. It may also come as unwelcome news to W+K London as the production company rival for Tesco’s affections is said to be Hogarth, WPP’s in-house production giant. WPP boss Sir Martin Sorrell has been determined to land Tesco, the UK’s biggest advertiser after the Government, for decades.

Most of Tesco’s advertising, £140m in total, goes on tactical press ads and the like these days although it’s run a series of short, snappy TV ads through W+K since appointing the agency last year. W+K is believed to happy about handing over the tactical execution of these to TAG.

So why the rumbles? One is the determination of WPP and Hogarth to muscle in on Tesco. The other is the arrival of some new brooms in Tesco’s procurement department who think they can slash production costs.