Martin Sorrell (readers of AdScam know him as “The Poisoned Dwarf") isn’t giving up on WPP Group’s struggling fifth network, now being reinvented as a micronetwork (I guess that means ity-bitty-small) suffering under the name of "United" that will be under new leadership. “This makes us more attractive as a micronetwork,” (ity-bity-etc) said Andy Berlin, chairman of United's U.S. agency, Berlin Cameron, and global CEO of the whole network. “You have got to have a strong New York and London presence in order to be an international player. We are a legitimate competitor with BBH [Bartle Bogle Hegarty], Mother and Fallon, but we are not patterned after them.” Oh Andy, that’s for damn sure, you’re not even on the same planet! The U.K. has always been a problem for a network that never really took off. It began when the Poisoned Dwarf put together a Milan-based network called Conquest Europe (modest name!) in the 1980s, mainly to handle Fiat’s Alfa Romeo account without posing a conflict to the Ford Motor Co. business at other WPP agency networks. (more on the Ford situation in a later post.) Andy Berlin was in London today (no doubt drowning in Bolinger in a suite at Claridges) to help “mastermind” (Caution, genious at work!) the restructuring of the U.K. shop. “Some of the networks sell uniformity, but that’s not what United is about,” he said. “We are highly individualistic. We want to be competitive through strength in individual markets and through our people who know each other and work well together.” Well Andy, whatever you think that means, it sounds like BS to me!
It was better when the Sex Pistols did it!
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