The Metro Canada newspaper group has chosen Rethink to create its first national marketing campaign following a review.
In response to an RFP issued in July, the 10-year-old Torstar-managed Metro received more than 30 submissions from agencies of various sizes.
“Their creative has been so cool and irreverent that we think its a really good fit for Metro,” said Jodi Brown, marketing and interactive director for Metro Canada. The paper targets “young active metropolitans” as its readership, and Rethink’s work for clients such as Playland and Science World demonstrated to Brown they could speak to this audience.
Brown originally planned to narrow the review to three short list finalists, but expanded the final round to five unnamed agencies before choosing Rethink.
“We had a really flattering number of agencies send of proposals,” she said. “Rethink had to score a lot of ‘perfect’ scores to land the job with us.”
Rethink’s work is set to appear in October with Starcom handling the planning. The paper has earmarked $2.9 million for the eight-week effort.
Creative will likely appear across out-of-home media in Metro cities (Toronto, Vancouver, Halifax, Ottawa, Calgary, Edmonton and Montreal) though Brown previously said Metro would consider television, radio and digital advertising as well.
Rethink’s still-young Toronto office will manage the account, but creative director duties will be split between Dré Labré in Toronto and Chris Staples, Rethink’s Vancouver-based co-founder.
“We’re thrilled to be working with Metro,” said Pema Hegan, managing director of Rethink’s Toronto office, in a release. “Metro is the most read national newspaper in the country and has been blazing a trail on digital platforms like Foursquare. We’re incredibly excited to help get even more Canadians reading the paper and connecting digitally with Metro.”
