Saatchi & Saatchi in £7m Standard Life creative win

Saatchi & Saatchi has scooped the estimated £7m creative project to run Standard Life’s high-profile demutualisation campaign following a competitive pitch. Ogilvy & Mather and The Leith Agency, which holds the assurance company’s £10.7m consu

Saatchi & Saatchi has scooped the estimated &£7m creative project to run Standard Life’s high-profile demutualisation campaign following a competitive pitch. Ogilvy & Mather and The Leith Agency, which holds the assurance company’s &£10.7m consumer account, were also shortlisted.

The Edinburgh-based financial services organisation is said to be keen to promote its proposed demutualisation after a previous attempt to demutualise in 2003 ended in failure.

The ads will focus on its corporate brand rather than the four business units that make up the group: Standard Life Assurance Company, Standard Life Investments, Standard Life Bank and Standard Life Healthcare.

Standard Life has appointed MediaCom to handle the project’s media buying ahead of consumer account incumbent Feather Brooksbank (MW last week).

Both the Leith and Feather Brooksbank will retain their accounts, although Standard Life is expected to invest less heavily in consumer advertising during the period in which the demutualisation work runs.

The assurance company has beefed up its senior management team last year ahead of its bid to demutualise.

In June last year, John Hylands was chosen to lead the demutualisation project and earlier this year former Marks & Spencer finance director Alison Reed was appointed to replace him as group finance director. She was chosen in part for her public company experience.

A Standard Life spokesman said it would be working with the agency on a number of ideas over the coming months.