Irish International wins lucrative Telecom account

Advertising agency, Irish International, has been awarded the lucrative contract for the Telecom Eireann flotation advertising campaign. Five agencies were short-listed and the winner was announced yesterday.

In addition to the ultimate winner, the four agencies invited to pitch for the business last Thursday were McCann Erickson, McConnells, DDFH&B and QMP. McConnells already handles the Telecom advertising account.

But despite this being a sale of Telecom shares and the heavy Telecom branding that is likely to be part of the winning campaign, Telecom Eireann is not the client. Because the Government is selling the shares in the company, the winner was chosen by the Department of Public Enterprise and its initial public offering steering committee.

The timing of the campaign will depend on the as yet undecided flotation date. Depending on market conditions, it is expected that the date will be some time in late June or early July, so the advertising campaign will be a relatively concentrated one, beginning most likely in April.

The flotation is the first with such a clear retail marketing brief. Previous flotations such as Irish Life and Greencore had a strong institutional dimension but, as anyone in the State over the age of 18 is eligible to buy Telecom shares, the campaign will obviously have to have a broad appeal. It is an unusual brief in that it is a financial product which will have to be marketed on a broad consumer level. Indeed, many of the potential customers will be first-time share buyers or those who have been given a taste of the stock market by the free share offers in recent building society flotations.

The agencies were asked to create advertising with two clear objectives. First, there is the "why to buy" aspect, followed by the "how to buy" details. It addition to this, it will largely be up to the advertising campaign to create the public excitement and enthusiasm that have to surround retail marketed public flotations if they are to be perceived as a success.

Given the wide target market and the short, focused time-frame, it is likely that Irish International's winning campaign will run across all media. Indeed, one of the more unusual requirements in the briefing document was that the winning agency must appoint a dedicated print manager to the campaign. No budget was recommended to the agencies, which has probably helped to encourage the advertising industry's rumour mill where there has been speculation that the campaign, including production costs, could run as high as £2 million.

Drury Communications, working with the UK communications company, Dewe Rogerson, has already been retained to advise the Department on the development of the diverse retail marketing programme, one element of which is the advertising campaign. Dewe Rogerson was chosen for its track record in the area. The London-based agency has worked on the majority of telecom flotations in Europe in the past five years.