Mullen wins SunTrust advertising account

SunTrust Banks Inc. of Atlanta announced today that it has selected Mullen of Wenham as its new lead advertising agency.

SunTrust said that the decision followed a competitive ad agency review process that included three ad agencies as finalists.

Until recently, Mullen created ads for another financial-services company, Wachovia Corp. of North Carolina. Just before it was recently disclosed that Citigroup had agreed to buy Wachovia's banking operations, Wachovia announced that it ad agency Ogilvy & Mather would create its ads. Then last week, a battle broke out for control of Wachovia when Wells Fargo made its own offer to buy the struggling Wachovia.

Speaking about winning the SunTrust ad account, Mullen chief executive Joe Grimaldi said in a statement: "This is clearly a transformational time in the financial services industry and a time of significant opportunity for SunTrust. "We are very much looking forward to working with the SunTrust team to position their brand, products and services for continued growth."

Other Mullen clients include the T.J. Maxx off-price retail chain; the Panera Bread restaurant chain; and National Grid, an energy company that serves more than 1 million Massachusetts customers.
(By Chris Reidy, Globe staff)