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Saatchi & Saatchi

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Saatchi & Saatchi

Saatchi and Saatchi is a British multinational communications and advertising agency network with 114 offices in 76 countries and more than 6,500 staff. It was founded in 1970 and is currently headquartered in London. The parent company of the agency group was known as Saatchi and Saatchi PLC from 1976 to 1994, was listed on the New York Stock Exchange and London Stock Exchange until 2000 and, for a time, was a constituent of the FTSE 100 Index. In 2000, the group was acquired by the Publicis Groupe. In 2005, the group went private.

Saatchi & Saatchi was founded in London by brothers Maurice (now Lord Saatchi) and Charles Saatchi in 1970. Following stints starting as a copywriter at the New York City offices of Benton & Bowles in 1965, then at Collett Dickenson Pearce and John Collins & Partners, Charles Saatchi teamed up with art director Ross Cramer, and the genesis of what would become Saatchi & Saatchi was born in London in 1967 as the creative consultancy CramerSaatchi. The consultancy took on employees John Hegarty and Jeremy Sinclair and began to work direct for clients. It was Sinclair's "Pregnant Man" ad for the Health Education Council which first attracted attention to the small agency. Charles's younger brother Maurice joined the business in 1970 after Cramer's departure whereupon it was renamed "Saatchi and Saatchi" and developed into a full-service advertising agency.

As a creative consultancy they had worked primarily on projects for agencies but having become a full service agency they were able to quickly build their own solid client base and, by 1975, this included blue-chip clients such as Associated Newspapers, British Leyland, Brutus Jeans, Cunard, Dunlop, National Magazines, and Nestle. They also worked for the Labour Party.

It was during these early years that the agency produced its first famous ad: the Pregnant Man for the UK's Health Education Council featuring a man who appeared to be pregnant.

In 1975, the Saatchi brothers set upon a ferocious course of business acquisitions. With the reverse takeover of the Garland Compton agency in 1975, they achieved a public company listing and were thereafter able to make rights issues to raise the capital required for their acquisition drive.

Garland Compton were a long established, conservative British agency, founded by Sidney Garland in 1927. In 1960, the US agency, Compton Advertising, bought a minority holding so that they could build their own international network, primarily to service their largest client, Procter & Gamble. Garland Compton was also a top 10 agency with big spending clients including Bass, British Caledonian, Gillette, New Zealand Dairy Board, Procter & Gamble, Schweppes and United Biscuits. They had also established a regional network of agencies and, of course, had access to the global Compton network. With the merger, the key management positions were taken by Saatchi people.

With the merger, Saatchi & Saatchi moved into Garland Compton's offices on 80 Charlotte Street in the west end of London; and the agency now found itself in the UK Top 5 agencies for size of billings.

The 13-year tenure of Saatchi was characterized by a consistent output of creative work and a focused approach toward increasing its international market presence.

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