LVCVA awards $500M advertising-marketing contract to R&R Partners

The Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority’s largest contract was awarded Tuesday to Las Vegas-based R&R Partners, the company that has held the contract for decades.

The six-year life of the contract, for advertising and marketing the destination, is valued at $500 million, by far the LVCVA’s largest contract.

The four-year contract with two option years was awarded after a vigorous competition among four finalists that prepared presentations on how they would present Las Vegas to the world in advertising and marketing campaigns in the future.

In a departure from previous years, the board split the advertising and marketing contract and R&R will share a piece of it with New York-based Grey Global Advertising, which will contract with the LVCVA as its social brand agency.

Grey, new to the Las Vegas market, received a two-year contract with two two-year options. The six-year contract with Grey is valued at a total $160 million.

“We saw a lot of good work,” LVCVA board chairman John Marz said of the daylong May 17 presentations by the four finalists that led to Tuesday’s unanimous decisions.

The awarding of the contract was delayed by 20 months when the coronavirus pandemic hit and the LVCVA board opted to extend R&R’s existing contract by a year and delay awarding a new contract.

When the request-for-proposals restarted in January, more than 40 companies applied and the LVCVA staff evaluated applications and trimmed the list to 18, then eight.

LVCVA President and CEO Steve Hill said a “star-studded group” of companies sought to win the contract and that it was difficult to eliminate the other contenders from the competition.

Hill said the total contract amounts are higher than what the LVCVA expects to budget for advertising and marketing over six years, but that provides flexibility with future budget augmentations to spend more or less, depending on revenue generated.

Hill said it’s easy to forget that R&R is a top-tier national advertising company because of local familiarity with the team assembled by principal Billy Vassiliadis.

“They have a brand that is iconic throughout the country and throughout the world,” Hill told the board. “We are fortunate to have them headquartered in Las Vegas, but because they are a national and international marketing firm, it’s sometimes easy to forget that when we can drive over to their offices. They live with us, they do things with us and we are exceptionally fortunate to have them here. They have a national and international presence and they have brought that expertise (to us.)”

Hill said R&R went beyond the scope of its contract on several occasions.

“They do things that were often unnoticed and certainly beyond the scope of work (in the contract),” he said. “That certainly was not unnoticed over the last 18 months.”

Hill said R&R has been quick to launch crisis communication tactics with the rapidly changing landscape to attract visitors particularly from the Southern California market.

Contact Richard N. Velotta at rvelotta@reviewjournal.com or 702-477-3893. Follow @RickVelotta on Twitter.