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Lunesta DTC Advertising Account Moves to Kaplan Thaler

Friday, Feb. 1, 2008 After a review that began late last year, Sepracor has decided to move the advertising account for Lunesta – perhaps one of the largest-spending DTC accounts of the past two years – to New York-based Kaplan Thaler.

 McCann HumanCare (a unit of the advertising group McCann Erickson) previously handled creative for the sleep-aid Lunesta and is the agency that developed the Luna moth icon for the brand.

McCann HumanCare, as well as other unidentified agencies, competed in the pitch at Sepracor. New ads for Sepracor, created by its former agency, are expected to break late this month or in March.

Kaplan Thaler is the agency that handles such Rx accounts as Lipitor and Celebrex for Pfizer. It is part of Publicis Groupe. The media portion of the Lunesta account, handled by Interpublic’s media unit Initiative, was not affected by the change in creative agencies, according to a report by AdAge.com.

According to Nielsen Monitor-Plus, the reported ad spending for Lunesta across all media totaled $183 million in the first half of 2007 and $329 million in 2006. It was the largest advertiser in the DTC category for 2006 and continued to outspend sleep-aid competitors Rozerem and Ambien CR through much of 2007.