Estee Lauder splits media account

Estee Lauder has split its $400m (£202.4m) global media planning and buying business between Omnicom’s M2M and WPP’s MindShare following an eight-month review.

It is understood that MindShare has won the US account from sister agency Maxus, while M2M has been handed the business in Asia and Europe. It already handled the account in the UK and Japan. Non-roster agency Media Planning Group also took part in the pitch.

Estee Lauder’s account was previously split between several agencies but the cosmetics giant has been looking to consolidate the business in a bid to move beyond its traditional media strategy, which has been based around luxury magazines and television.

The Estee Lauder business is worth $75m in the Asia Pacific region alone. There will be a particular marketing focus on China, Korea and Japan.

The Estee Lauder win follows OMD’s appointment to handle Intel’s $300m global media planning and buying account. The agency beat incumbent Universal McCann, which had handled the account since March 2005, and Starcom to win the Intel business.