Bosses at direct marketing agency Stack are gearing up for yet another review of its Peugeot, Citroën and DS accounts after the marques’ parent company Groupe PSA confirmed it is conducting what it describes as “agency reconnaissance”.
Car brands’ relationships with their agencies are rarely short-term affairs. PSA has worked with the MSQ Partners’ agency for over a decade, having appointed Stack – then Clark McKay Walpole – to Peugeot in 2005.
Prior to that, the business was handled by EHS Brann (now Havas Helia) for over 14 years.
Stack picked up the Citroën CRM activity in 2009 after the incumbent, Kitcatt Nohr, landed the Toyota business. Motor brands are notoriously picky about conflicting business. At the time, Citroën UK said that Kitcatt Nohr had resigned by mutual consent.
Citroën extended its UK relationship with Stack in 2013, handing the agency all of its CRM activity for both used cars and business customers.
OMD UK handles media planning and buying for PSA in the UK.
The review is understood to have been triggered in part by PSA’s ambitious expansion strategy; in April the group revealed it was planning to launch 26 new models across all three car brands by 2021.
A Groupe PSA spokesman said: “I can confirm we are conducting agency reconnaissance, as we often do around this time of the year, to see who can best offer us specialist services (that include CRM) in order to maximise competitive opportunities. Only when this work is complete will we decide on how best to move forward.”
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