Ford cashes in on Trump tariffs
Ad holding groups fall as tech clients are hammered
It’s an ill wind…someone will benefit from Trump’s tariffs, although, not maybe, the President as US prices rise in a global economy. US car manufacturers should if they source enough domestically and Ford has been quick out of the blocks to remind people that it makes more of its cars in the US than rivals do (I’ll tell that to an acquaintance whose Mustang was becalmed in Mexico for months.)
Ford has been banging the patriot drum with ‘Built. Ford. Proud’ and various spins from Wieden+Kennedy for a while now and Bryan Cranston is back with an enticing offer: customers now pay employee prices (imported car parts presumably carry a new tariff so its prices will go up too.)
From the UK and Europe’s POV it’s good that he hasn’t slapped tariffs on services yet. Would be an interesting dilemma for Publicis, WPP and Dentsu.
Update
Although services aren’t yet included in Trump’s tariffs, the ad holding groups are taking a big powder along with other leading stocks – WPP down 5% today (Monday) close to a year low, Publicis down 7% and Omnicom nearly 4%. Tech stocks have suffered more and with such companies playing a leading role in sustaining global ad expenditure the outlook for the ad holding groups and other agencies is looking grimmer by the day.
