Citi to Launch Ad Blitz: Report
From The New York Post:
Citigroup, Wall Street’s poster child for bad banks, is about to launch an advertising campaign aimed at burnishing its badly tarnished image, sources tell The Post.
According to people familiar with the matter, Citi as soon as next month could pull the wraps off an ad blitz that will highlight its virtues and looks to build public confidence for a management team that has been under fire ever since Citi took $45 billion in federal rescue cash.
Though details of the ad campaign are scant, the media push is expected to spell out the positive strides that Citi has made in using taxpayer money, such as helping consumers stay in their homes by modifying home mortgages, and defend the bank and CEO Vikram Pandit against those pressing for a change of leadership, sources said. It’s not clear if Pandit will be featured in any ads.
What a challenge for Citi! Citi has to assert itself as a viable banking enterprise, even when it probably isn’t. It will likely ignore the fact that the federal government is its beneficiary, but if it goes too far out on a limb, people (read: bloggers) will call it out for portraying itself as something that it is not. About the only safe tagline available to Citi is, “Citi, Still a Bank*.”
* “a member of US Government family of companies”
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