• by David Goetzl , March 1, 2010

With many consumers still having to cut back on spending, Omnicom said it is launching a new agency dedicated to serving as a one-stop-shop for retailers on the local level.

Retail 3, or R3, is promising services stretching from creative to email marketing to media buying and planning. Plus, it offers a venue to keep former BBDO Detroit executives in the Omnicom fold.

The Retail 3 moniker is derived from "Retail Strategy, Retail Activation and Retail Metrics." Potential customers, Omnicom said, could come from the auto, quick-service restaurant, as well as the telecommunications provider and financial-service sectors.

Omnicom CEO John Wren stated that R3 is looking to offer "capabilities to deliver campaign effectiveness from brand awareness to the point-of-sale retail buying experience." R3 is led by president Harold Kobakof, who was chief retail officer at BBDO in Detroit. A slew of other employees also comes from the defunct agency, which worked for Chrsyler for years before the agency lost the business.

The new shop -- which seems ripe for regional auto dealer associations -- is based in the Detroit area, but has 40 employees spread across the country. Showing how R3 is focusing on local-market activation, one staffer not from BBDO is John Morton, who was director of sales in the Mid-Atlantic for Comcast's spot cable sales arm.

Omnicom stated: "The agency is founded on a culture of accountability, driven by proprietary systems that provide a 360-degree view of data and metrics. These links to retail databases allow marketers to assess what is working and what is not working and make appropriate adjustments in real time."