John Wren
John Wren

Omnicom is setting up the Omnicom Advertising Group to house its proud creative ad agencies—BBDO, DDB and TBWA—under a single organization as of Jan. 1.

CEO John Wren is also throwing Goodby Silverstein & Partners, GSD&M, Merkley & Partners and Zimmerman into the mix.

OMC’s announcement claims that each agency will retain its “unique brand, culture and people, while capitalizing on OAG’s shared and scaled investments in innovative tools, technologies, specialist capabilities, and AI platforms.”

It is supposed to unlock greater opportunities for personal and professional growth.

The mash-up also will unlock greater opportunities to cut costs, which is music to the ears of a bean-counter like Wren.

You can bet OAG’s headcount will be lower on Jan. 1, 2026 than on the upcoming New Year’s Day.

Business Roundtable pats itself on the back. Though DEI programming is under a full-scale attack, the BR claims its landmark “Statement on the Purpose of a Corporation” published in 2019 has been a rousing success.

That declaration stated that companies “should aim to deliver long-term value to all of their stakeholders—customers, employees, suppliers, the communities in which they operate, and their shareholders.”

The Purpose statement replaced a 1997 proclamation that a company’s “paramount duty” is to its stockholders, and that the interests of employees and other stakeholders are relevant only “as a derivative of the duty to stockholders.”

BR on August 16 issued a five-year assessment of the Purpose statement, and found that member companies have progressed in delivering both purpose and profit.

It claims that more than 7M Americans entered the middle class from 2018 to 2022 through jobs at big companies, and that tens of thousands of small businesses grew due to partnerships with BR members.

“These gains for American workers and suppliers have been aided largely by the innovative approaches that financially successful companies are taking to invest in their workers, suppliers and communities,” said BR.

The organization cited Purpose investments made by companies such as Walmart, JPMorganChase, Cisco, PepsiCo and Google.

For example, 26K Pepsi workers signed up for the myEducation platform, offering tuition-free access to upskilling bootcamps, degree programs, digital literacy courses and other learning opportunities from more than 25 schools and universities. Participants are twice as likely to get promoted and stay with Pepsi, according to the company.

BR believes its Purpose statement is as relevant today as it was five years ago, and will be five years down the road.

Lowe’s begs to differ with BR….The home improvement chain is the latest company to cave to conservative influencer Robby Starbuck’s crusade against DEI initiatives.

"I messaged Lowe's executives last week to let them know that I planned to expose their woke policies," Starbuck wrote on X on Aug. 26. "This morning I woke up to an email where they preemptively made big changes.”

The retailer will end its participation in surveys by the LGBTQ advocacy group Human Rights Campaign, and drop sponsorship of Pride events.

It will focus on focusing on community events dealing with affordable housing, disaster relief and skilled trade education.

Lowe’s follows the footsteps of Deere & Co. and Tractor Supply to shelf DEI measures.

The company denies bowing before Starbuck, claiming the revamped DEI programming was in the works.

After all, bowing to the demands of a former Nashville music video producer would be pretty embarrassing for a company that is projecting $85B in fiscal 2024 revenues.