GSD&M wins BMW worldwide advertising account

BMW AG has selected GSD&M Idea City, based in Austin TX, as its lead global agency of creative for brand advertising communications. Prior to this decision, the global creative duties were shared among various international marketing agencies, operating independently from several countries across the world. This is the first international account for GSD&M Idea City and BMW represents the highest profile customer at this point.

The Austin based ad agency started working with BMW of North America back in 2005 and the road to this win was quite difficult, several agencies went through extensive competitive reviews.

“We are delighted to have an agency such as GSD&M Idea City with the potential to set further creative benchmarks with BMW global brand communications in the future. We will be working with our partner to continue sharpening BMW’s brand profile through focused and emotional communications,” said Jan-Christiaan Koenders, director brand communication, BMW and group marketing services, in a statement.

The first task for GSD&M is the development of a new global communication campaign focused on the “Joy” theme which was recently mentioned in the new “Expression of Joy” BMW Z4. The marketing campaign will take place worldwide at auto shows, private and public events, print and online media. Even though not confirmed in the press release, we expect GSD&M to organize the campaign around the upcoming BMW X1 which carries the marketing catchy name “This is your world”

The new global communication campaign will be introduced in Europe throughout summer 2009 and is being planned for a US roll-out in early 2010.