Publicis Rebukes WPP CEO Over Pitchless Business Wins

On Oct. 29, WPP CEO Cindy Rose told investors that encouraging clients to bypass due diligence does the industry no favors. Her comments came during WPP’s Q3 earnings call in October. Rose criticized a growing trend of pitchless “CEO handshakes” during holdco earnings calls with investors.

Rose said: “I do not think we do ourselves any favor as an industry of professionals by encouraging clients to bypass proper due diligence. I think I will leave it at that.”

She did not name Publicis directly, but Publicis answered the broader criticism in an open letter obtained by ADWEEK. In the letter, Publicis defended the way it wins new business, disputed what it called Rose’s “theory” about its process and called the criticism “an insult to clients’ intelligence.”

Publicis also named two major accounts won without a pitch:

• PepsiCo’s global media business came without a pitch.
• LVMH’s Asia-Pacific account came without a pitch.

Publicis’s argument is that those outcomes reflect rigorous client testing, not skipped due diligence. In the company’s account, omitting a traditional pitch did not remove the work required to evaluate and select the agency.

Rose argued that an industry encouraging clients to bypass proper due diligence harms its professionals. She tied that criticism to the “CEO handshake” trend she discussed with investors.

Publicis frames the issue around its own process: the firm says client evaluation remained even as the pitch was omitted.

Does no pitch mean no due diligence?

Rose addressed a growing practice rather than one named transaction. Publicis supplied the narrower case: two major wins obtained without a pitch and presented as the product of client testing.

For marketing leadership, the exchange turns on one operational question: can a direct award preserve due diligence without a formal pitch? Publicis says yes. Rose says the trend puts that discipline at risk.

Her quoted response was blunt. The final sentence was economical, perhaps too economical. Because the passage cited no client or agency and described no failed selection process, it left Publicis to answer with its own record. Publicis moved the argument from principle to process: testing, rather than a pitch, did the selecting work.

The immediate public answer is clearer than the substantive resolution. Publicis has rejected the suggestion that it won business by avoiding client scrutiny, and it has attached two named accounts to that denial.

Rose has articulated a broader concern about industry behavior, but she did not identify Publicis or cite its two accounts. Neither position, as presented, settles the wider question about pitchless wins.

The letter addresses Publicis’s approach; Rose’s warning addresses what she says the industry is encouraging. That leaves each side with a different burden of proof.

What should marketing leaders ask?

For marketing leaders weighing a direct award, the disagreement supplies a concrete question: what client testing occurred before selection? Publicis’s answer is that rigorous testing occurred. Rose’s warning is that skipping a pitch can become skipping proper due diligence.

Publicis does not need a ceremonial pitch to defend its process, but it does need to show the process. Publicis has put client testing ahead of the pitch in its public defense.

Rose, meanwhile, has kept her objection at industry level. The exchange produces a modest but usable verdict: Publicis made its case publicly, while the warning about pitchless wins remains broader than two accounts.

The pitch vanished from the argument. Due diligence stayed.