Chobani has cut its list of creative agency contenders to Droga5 and The Martin Agency and scheduled final presentations for next week. Wieden+Kennedy and BBH had also been participating in the review, which was launched earlier this summer. The incumbent, Boathouse, was invited to defend but declined.
“We were happy and appreciative to have four of the best agencies in the world competing for our business,” said Chobani chief marketing and brand officer Peter McGuinness, who joined the yogurt company in July. “They all did a great job—passionate, smart, strategic and creative—so it was a very difficult decision.”
McGuinness is also looking at the company's public relations strategy and has narrowed his search to Weber Shandwick, MSLGroup and incumbent FleishmanHillard. The former DDB Chicago president plans to ramp up those efforts, particularly around products and in more specialized areas like crisis management. (Chobani has come under scrutiny for the use of genetically-modified feeds to dairy cows supplying its milk as well as disposal of the‘acid whey’ production byproduct seen as an environmental hazard.)
Until now, most of the company’s PR has focused on its Turkish immigrant founder, CEO Hamdi Ulukaya, who built Chobani into a billion-dollar company in six years.