Virgin Atlantic and Virgin Holidays have appointed AMV BDDO as their first-ever joint creative agency.
Virgin Atlantic and Virgin Holidays operate as two individual brands and will continue to do so – with AMV BBDO tasked with developing complementary, but distinctive, marketing strategies for each.
The decision to consolidate creative work under one agency stems from a desire to improve marketing efficiencies and deliver greater synergy and cohesion between the two brand strategies.
AMV BBDO has been appointed after a closed agency pitch against incumbent Virgin Atlantic agency Adam & Eve.
Both Adam & Eve and AMV BBDO are highly valued agency partners, which is underscored by the decision to run this as a closed pitch between two incumbents and not invite competitor agencies to tender.
The international roster of agencies that support Virgin Atlantic, such as Figliulo & Partners in New York, are not impacted and their contract has similarly been extended for three years.
AMV BBDO will have a joint reporting line to Claire Cronin, senior vice president of marketing at Virgin Atlantic, and Amber Kirby, vice president of marketing and customer experience at Virgin Holidays.
Kirby joined the business earlier this month after a position as global brand and marketing director at Boots Walgreen Alliance
Cronin commented: “Aligning our creative work under a single award-winning agency will help us ensure we deliver more complementary marketing strategies that continue to grow each individual brand – and the creativity and enthusiasm from AMV BBDO knocked it out of the park for us.
“Adam & Eve has been a phenomenal agency partner, who we cannot recommend highly enough, and we would like to thank them for the incredible work they’ve delivered over the previous four years.”
The priority objective for AMV BBDO will be to launch a new creative platform for Virgin Atlantic, following the decision to retire Let It Fly – and to extend the current Seize the Holiday platform for Virgin Holidays.