The auction for Romania's country brand was suspended

The short list of the auction for Romania’s tourism brand, including 3 out of the initial 13 competing consortiums, was contested by two of the participating companies. The Ministry of Tourism is accused of discrimination and not considering the conditions of the tender book, according to the documents available on the website of public acquisitions.

The 3 consortiums qualifying for the second phase of the auction are TBWA Bucuresti – GfK Romania, Saffron Brand Consultants – Brandient Consult – Acacia Avenue Limited and THR, Asesores en Turismo, Hoteleria y Recreacion – Taylor Nelson Sofres.

The last phase of the auction, selecting the tender with the lowest price was scheduled for July 7. On the same day, it would have been announced the consortium to administrate the amount of EUR 2 mil. allocated by the Government for the development of the country’s brand.

Two contestations were submitted on the site of public acquisitions, one by the German branding company, Landor Associates GmbH, which has participated to the auction together with Millward Brown international research company and the other by the branding and design company Hypermedia Solutions LLC dba FutureBrand located in the United States.

FutureBrand company finds itself discriminated due to younger employees and accuses the Ministry of Tourism of not taking into consideration the legal 43 days notification deadline for the bidders who entered the pre-selection and also of not disqualifying GfK research company, whose subsidiaries were included in two different consortiums – GfK NOP, together with Saatchi & Saatchi Design, and GfK Romania together with TBWA Bucharest.

Landor demands that TBWA and THR Asesores en Turismo, Hoteleria y Recreacion to be disqualified, as they don’t meet the condition of the Ministry of Tourism regarding a partnership with a company specialized in brand consulting.

Landor Associates GmbH also refers to the private address on Yahoo! Mail used for the Ministry’s electronic mail, breaking the law’s stipulations regarding electronic signature and complains that no explanation was communicated for declining the company’s tender, nor a deadline for submitting contestation.

Sursa: Wall-Street [15.07.2009]