Publicis Groupe scoops global Nivea ad account

Publicis Groupe has become Nivea’s global advertising partner, while WPP has clinched brand owner Beiersdorf’s Eucerin and Hansaplast brands, after a holding group pitch.

The Hamburg-based personal-care company appointed the two agency groups after a pitch led from Europe that also involved Omnicom and Accenture Interactive.

Beiersdorf is looking to overhaul its marketing output and has actively sought to arrange its advertising with major holding groups. Nivea previously worked with Interpublic's FCB, which resigned the business earlier this year.

Publicis is setting up a bespoke agency network team dubbed One Touch to manage the business. It will handle all Nivea’s skincare and deodorant brand advertising, spanning creative through to digital. Publicis is not working on media planning and buying. The French-owned ad company has a similar "power of one" set-up for Mercedes-Benz, called Publicis Emil.

Both agency group relationships will be led from Europe, reaching 40 markets. The partnership officially kicks off in January 2020. One Touch will have hubs in cities including New York, Sao Paulo, Cape Town, Dubai, Mumbai, and Hamburg.

Asim Naseer, Nivea’s chief marketing officer, said: "This decision marks an important milestone for our global brand building efforts, driving the transformation of our iconic Nivea brand.

"Publicis Groupe has demonstrated very strong skills in strategy development and in leading inspiring, persuasive creative ideas. We are convinced that we have found the right partner to jointly accelerate Nivea’s growth through consumer-centric marketing excellence."

Publicis’s pitch team was led by Justin Billingsley, chief executive of Publicis Groupe DACH (Germany, Austria and Switzerland). He said: "The partnership marks a new phase in Nivea’s marketing transformation journey and we are excited to be a part of it. Our ‘Power of One’ model integrates data, creativity and technology and is designed to focus on business growth for our client."

The review was managed by management consultancies The Observatory and The Alchemists.

Campaign has not heard back from WPP at the time of writing and Beiersdorf did not comment on the WPP aspect of the pitch.