Firms join forces to build buying powerhouse<BR>

The phoenix rising from the ashes of the two departments will be called MindShare and will follow a global decision by the two networks to meld their media-buying potential in an effort to shore up their market presence.
It will be "a very strong structure, able to effectively fight over the market," said Witold Gawda, head of Telewizja Polska's (TVP) Biuro Reklamy, the public broadcaster's advertising division.
Gawda, who is also a president of the local International Advertising Association (IAA) office, will leave TVP at the end of May to become the managing director MindShare.
The house, which is currently looking for a location for its new office, initially will employ around 30 people and possibly include the media directors, Tomasz Chelmecki and Mikolaj Komornicki, now working for Ogilvy & Mather and J. Walter Thompson/Parintex, respectively.
"We're still negotiating, but I sincerely hope the two directors will accept the new job offers," Gawda said.
He added that he personally felt very excited to "be able to take part in the creation of a brand new company, which will use the media potential of two major advertising agencies."
Gawda said he decided to leave state-owned TVP after five years because the new company offered "opportunity and much more dynamic growth."
He also said last week that his former deputy, Maria Gorecka-Warchol, may take his old job at Biuro Reklamy.
"I've submitted her offer to (TVP's) managing board, and they seemed to have tentatively accepted it," he said.
A step back
After staring down TVP's news program for six months, newcomer TVN may have blinked. The station, which began airing in October, is considering moving its main news program, "Fakty," from 7:30 p.m. to 7 p.m. TVN originally wanted the news show to compete head-to-head with TVP's popular "Wiadomosci" aired at the same time. The decision has not been made, but TVN spokeswoman Lidia Deja said the station is thinking about shifting "Fakty" because the news show has failed to attract enough viewers.
"The pace of the increase in viewership is not dynamic enough," she said.
According to media research group AGB Polska, in February "Wiadomosci" had 57.2% of the total TV viewership, while "Fakty" accounted only for 5.2%. While TVP's signal reaches all of Poland, TVN's covers only 60% of the country.
Deja wasn't able to say when TVN will decide whether to move "Fakty," but she said proposed changes at the station may include other shows in addition to the news program. Deja refused to comment further. Joanna Bancerowska, TVP's deputy director of the board, said the possible slot change for "Fakty" will have no effect on "Wiadomosci."
"We're trying to create a good news program for the viewers," she said. "The program does not align with competitors."
And the winner is ...
Two months after Warsaw picked its favorite media advertisements during the January Kreatura awards, Krakow followed suit Feb. 28, handing out statues for the best campaigns of 1997.
The jury of the Crackfilm Advertisement Festival, organized by the advertising firm Crackfilm Agency, handed out 20 statues for accomplishments in nine fields. The grand prize went to advertising firm Grey Warszawa for a multimedia campaign prepared for Bosman Browar, Szczecin's non-alcoholic beer. The campaign also won three other statues, for best Polish advertisement film, best radio spot and best screenplay.
Distributed in northwestern Poland, the campaign included movie and radio spots as well as billboards and press advertisements. The commercials feature several Polish people, such as a librarian or a soccer fan, who praise the beer and wink, almost as if to share a joke.
Asked if the winking was meant to make fun of current advertising laws which theoretically ban alcohol advertising, Grey Creative Director Marek Bimer denied that the wink meant anything. It was just a friendly gesture directed at viewers, he said.
"Everyone has a right to their own interpretation of the ad," he said. "Our job was just to create a campaign for a non-alcoholic beer."
In addition to the statues awarded for Bosman's campaign, Grey also won two other statues: one for a song for the Radio Zet spot and another statue going to the author of the song's lyrics, Magda Goll.
Another big winner was Corporate Profiles/DDB, which walked away with three statues. One went to Danny Hielle for his pictures and another to Stefaan Verrijken for his editing work on a spot for tire company Stomil-Olsztyn.
The agency shared the statues with Film Studio "OTO." The third statue Corporate Profiles/DDB received was for its adaptation of the Lays' potato chip commercial.
- Lidia Kelly contributed to
this column