News In Brief 15 June 2005

Levitra Dumps Saatchi & Saatchi

It appears that Saatchi & Saatchi, of Publicis Group's Consumer Healthcare division, wasn't ready for that special moment, as Levitra removed them from the ad campaign. The loss for Saatchi & Saatchi is reported to be in the neighborhood of $140-Million.

"We weren't just strong and lasting" offered a Saatchi spokesperson. "We didn't have the quality when it counted".

Problems with account surfaced when it was determined that the ad executives could only work on the account for four-hours at a time. On other occasions, those working on Levitra suffered from a blue tinge, or got flush, had stuffy or runny noses.

Schering-Plough, who produces the drug, initially was very satisfied with Saatchi's work.

However, with stiff competition in the marketplace, the work became harder

"We really worked to maintain the quality of the account"