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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1997 Week 10 Hansard (24 September) . . Page.. 3219 ..

Marketing and Promotion Campaign

MS McRAE: My question is to the Chief Minister and it is in relation to the Feel the Power of Canberra campaign. Chief Minister, why has the control and ownership of the campaign been allowed to be retained by J. Walter Thompson?

MRS CARNELL: Thank you very much for the question. Mr Speaker, a licence fee of something like 5 per cent will be paid to J. Walter Thompson as a result of this ongoing approach or the business approach that we have taken on this, with the branding exercise. The Government, as we have already said, recognised the need for a coordinated marketing approach. We brought on the best in the world, J. Walter Thompson. In an arrangement that has minimised the outlay for the Government, J. Walter Thompson will retain the intellectual property rights for Feel the Power of Canberra for three years, at which time it will revert to the Territory at no cost.

In the meantime, a licence fee of 5 per cent will be payable for the use of the brand vision through City Graphics, the company selected to implement the campaign. The reason why this was done in this way, quite simply, was to minimise the cost to the Territory and to make sure that we could have the campaign, get it out there and spend all the money that we possibly could on getting poster campaigns and television advertising, and getting the message out there to the business community, to the tourist community and to Australia generally. This approach really has minimised the up-front cost to the ACT Government, and, as such, I believe was a good business deal.

MS McRAE: I have a supplementary question. Chief Minister, is it not highly unusual for the ACT Government, which has paid at least $100,000 for a key marketing and advertising campaign, to allow a private advertising firm to retain the ownership and intellectual property, instead of the Government? Can you indicate whether any other ACT Government advertising contracts have allowed individual advertising firms to own the campaign? If so, which?

MRS CARNELL: Mr Speaker, I do not know how often I have to say that it is not an advertising campaign. This is the brand vision. They do not own the advertising campaign; they own the brand vision. Those opposite would have to look a long way to find another situation where a worldwide company like J. Walter Thompson would put a brand vision together for a city like Canberra for $50,000. The cost of putting the brand vision together was $50,000 in the first year. In the second year it is $50,000 to manage the use of that brand vision.

Mr Speaker, I am told that, of a half a million dollar marketing and promotion fund, the commission payable to J. Walter Thompson would be an absolute maximum of $25,000. That is not an awful lot out of half a million dollars. It has saved the ACT Government significantly up front. I do not think anyone would doubt that one of the problems we have is that the money we have available is not the sort of money that Atlanta has or Coke has when they want a new branding vision. We had to do it on a budget. This is a way that we can get that marketing campaign, that brand vision, the advertising campaign, all of the bits of this whole approach, out there in the market for the dollars that we can afford. At the end of three years, Mr Speaker, the brand vision reverts to the ACT Government at no cost.

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