Constituency Management Group, the marketing and communications portfolio owned by Interpublic Group which includes agencies Golin, Weber Shandwick, DeVries Global, Current, Axis and Creation, saw a breakout performance in the first quarter of 2017, posting mid-single digit organic growth of 4.6 percent to $346.3 million for the period, compared to $340.4 million during 2016's first quarter.

Weber Shandwick CEO Andy Polansky told O’Dwyer’s that Golin and DeVries each exhibited double-digit organic growth in the quarter, with Weber registering low single-digit organic growth compared to high-single digit organic growth seen during the first quarter of 2016.  

IPG

“Weber Shandwick had particularly strong growth in international markets including Japan, Mexico, Germany, France, the U.K. and Korea,” Polansky said. “Our collaborative culture continues to help us deliver on new opportunities in the converging marketing services landscape across geographies and capabilities, including creative, social, digital, analytics and strategy.”

Polansky also noted that Weber's healthcare and consumer marketing practices, as well as its digital, content marketing and social media teams, continued to be key growth drivers.                        

Across the ad/PR combine, Interpublic today reported first quarter revenue of more than $1.75 billion, a .7 percent uptick from Q1 2016’s $1.74 billion, with year-over-year organic revenue up 2.7 percent.

Revenue gains in the U.S. were notably strong, where organic revenue increased 2.9 percent for the year, compared to 2.2 percent internationally. Latin America saw impressive organic gains of 3.7 percent and Asia Pacific experienced organic increases of 2.7 percent. Growth in the U.K., meanwhile, lagged by comparison, at .2 percent.

Operating income at the holding company gained by 29.1 percent to $29.7 million, compared to $23 million a year ago. Operating margin increased 40 basis points compared to last year's first quarter, at 1.7 percent, compared to Q1 2016’s 1.3 percent.

In a Friday earnings statement, IPG chairman and CEO Michael Roth said that while the first quarter “is seasonally small for us,” the communications combine’s Q1 results “showed solid organic revenue growth in the quarter, with contributions from across our agencies and all marketing disciplines,” numbers that were “consistent with the view we had coming into the year.”

Roth also said IPG believes it's well positioned to achieve its full-year targets of organic revenue in the three-four percent range, as well an opportunity to improve operating margin by an additional 50 basis points relative to 2016 levels.