Gerry D’Angelo is retiring as the top global media executive of Procter & Gamble Co., the company said. D’Angelo oversaw the packaged goods giant’s extensive in-housing of media planning and buying as well as efforts to expand reach in an increasingly fragmented media market.
Procter & Gamble's top media executive is stepping down
“Media continues to be a strategic priority for P&G,” a spokeswoman said in a statement. “We are focused on building a media organization that is best in class at creating value for our brands, providing superior communication to our consumers and leading innovation in media. We are working through a transition plan” regarding how D’Angelo’s position will be filled.
D'Angelo in a statement said that “Working at Procter & Gamble has been the highlight of my career, and it has been a privilege to have played a part in its media transformation. I look forward to spending more time with my family but intend to stay active in the industry, advising and mentoring the next generation of leaders.”
D’Angelo came to P&G in 2016 from Mondelēz, a relatively rare outside hire for the company that mostly promotes from within. He’s overseen a media transformation that his bosses, Chairman-CEO Jon Moeller and Chief Brand Officer Marc Pritchard, have discussed extensively over the past year that includes in-house media planning and buying as well as increased use of programmatic trading of digital media and connected TV.
In the process, P&G brands at the forefront of such efforts, such as Tide and Pampers, have been able to attain reach of up to 90% of target audiences as the company has slowed its spending growth over the past year while still beating revenue forecasts.
Long the biggest global advertiser, P&G was ranked No. 4 last year by Ad Age Datacenter, with $11.1 billion in estimated marketing spending in the fiscal year ended June 2022. But, as Moeller and Pritchard have said repeatedly over the past year, the emphasis increasingly is on expanding reach and managing the frequency of impressions rather than just spending more money.
Based in Geneva, D’Angelo is also co-chair of the World Federation of Advertisers and has been one of the drivers of that group’s recently updated global charter, which intensified focus on competition issues in the global media market and brand safety, including development of the Global Alliance for Responsible Media.