Gen-Z, Millennial Opps: Vice Media considers going public with merger, hires chief creative officer (Score 85)

Vice Media will hopefully take some pretty good ad-Vice; it is reportedly considering going public by merging with blank-check firm 7CG Holdings and Co. This move would value Vice at $3v, down around 50% from the company's valuation after a funding round in 2017. If it does merge, Vice will have a larger budget at its disposal, which could result in higher spend and/or agency reviews.

In March 2021, Vice hired Chris Garbutt as its chief creative officer. Before his most recent position as PLTFRMR's co-founder, Garbutt served as the global chief creative officer at TBWA\Worldwide. Now that it has a new creative officer at it's helm, Vice will likely shake up its advertising campaigns and spend more. It also hired brand strategy director Tucker Hughes the same month.

According to Pathmatics, this media company has spent approximately $1.5m on digital ads YTD, up 36% from the approximately $1.1m it spent within the same 2020 timeframe. Vice ended up allocating around $3.1m on this channel in 2020, only around a fifth of the roughly $10.5m it allocated in 2019. So far this year, it has earned ~177.3m digital impressions via desktop display (37%), Facebook (24%), Twitter (14%), mobile display (13%) and Instagram (12%) ads. 98% of this year's desktop display ads have been placed site direct onto destinations such as theverge.com (32%), shmoop.com, freep.com, usatoday.com and beliefnet.com.

Additionally, Magellan reveals Vice has aired eight podcast ads within the past 12 months.

As you can see, the company's digital spend is picking back up after a serious decline last year. Like I briefly mentioned, its spend will likely keep climbing after its potential merger. Sellers able to offer high-ROI strategies among Gen-Z and millennial consumers will have a notable advantage.

Agency & martech readers - We haven't heard of any roster shifts since Vice hired CMO Nadja Bellan-White in October, and your window of opportunity is not only still open but bigger due to its additional personnel shifts. The likelihood of agency reviews would also rise if Vice is acquired. Right now, VIRTUE handles the company's creative, and Noble People is its media AOR.