• by Joe Mandese  @mp_joemandese, January 31, 2008

In a major push into environmental marketing, Publicis Groupe has acquired Act Now Productions, a San Francisco-based company that consults marketers on so-called "sustainability" practices and strategies. Act Now's first act under Publicis will be to become part of Saatchi & Saatchi's new "S" network, a division of the venerable agency focused on developing marketing communications programs that "activate corporate and consumer action on a mass scale to address environmental and economic sustainability."

Adam Werbach, the head of Act Now, has been appointed CEO of Saatchi & Saatchi S and will report to Andy Murray, Global CEO of Saatchi & Saatchi X, indicating that the environmental unit will focus heavily on physical environments to get its clients' sustainability messages out. Saatchi X is Saatchi's experiential marketing unit, and relies heavily on physical events and in-store marketing programs.

The move is partly a business diversification strategy for Publicis, which is in the throes of reshaping its marketing services portfolio for the future, with a heavy emphasis on digital. But it also appears to be a genuine push toward corporate goodwill. By utilizing Saatchi's branding, planning, creative, and media and resources, the new sustainability consulting service hopes to influence corporations, employees, retailers and consumers to make better environmental decisions.

Chairman-CEO Maurice Levy acknowledged that Publicis' motivation is, "not only to better help our clients communicate about the important issue of sustainability," but to help them "understand these issues in a strategic way and help them find real solutions adapted to their needs, while communicating in an efficient and effective way."

Saatchi & Saatchi S currently has offices in San Francisco and Boulder, CO, and plans to open in New York, Chicago, Fayetteville, AK, London and Beijing in early 2008.