WPP has been performing better on the new business front and it doesn’t come much better than a $1.9bn ten-year contract with the US Marine corps.
VML has been awarded the task of recruiting 40,000 marines annually, continuing a relationship that goes way back to the high days of J. Walter Thompson (now part of VML) which handled the account for a dizzying 77 years. The new deal features a 200-strong unit called, reasonably enough, Thompson.
Back at the turn of the century the account was reported as worth $200m annually, which is a lot of inflation even after 24 years. Let’s hope, for Thompson’s sake, that new US president D. Trump, who says he likes to end wars not start them, doesn’t intervene.
