Crispin Porter & Bogusky wins more Best Buy – Client moves the bulk of advertising in 2009 to the shop, dealing a blow to Omnicom Group’s BBDO, which did the heavy lifting on the retailer’s $380 million account this year. The client plans to focus overwhelmingly on its Geek Squad customer-support unit — which Crispin handles — at the expense of the traditional branding work it gets from BBDO. [Source: Ad Age]
Publicis’s VivaKi gets into social media – The Nerve Center, part of Publicis Groupe’s media and digital umbrella unit VivaKi, has been charged with creating tools and dashboards that agencies across the company can use to buy media and analyze its performance. It has search and display buying tools and now is adding a social media toolkit. Vendors include: Socialmedia.com, Buddy Media, Vitrue, Meebo, SocialVibe, Converseon, Yahoo and Facebook. [Source: Ad Age]
Domenico Vitale, Lowe’s chief strategic officer for North America is leaving – At the Interpublic Group agency he will be succeeded by Leeann Mitchell Leahy, an executive vice president and global planning director at the New York shop. [Source: Adweek]
WPP takes over customer relationship management at Groupe Danone – Groupe Danone is know for its dairy products and mineral waters. The company’s CRM team will join WPP’s operating network Y&R Brands in Paris. The group has also acquired certain assets of Groupe Danone. [Source: Brand Republic]
