LONDON —WPP agency Clarion has been awarded the B2B brief for Danone without a competitive pitch, working across its portfolio of dairy and plant-based products, waters and nutrition, with brands including Evian, Volvic, Activia, Actimel, Alpro and Cow & Gate.

Clarion won the Danone B2B account as a result of its previous B2B PR and marketing work for brands including Diageo, Unilever, Jacobs Douwe Egberts and Soreen.

The agency has been charged with growing Danone’s presence across the trade media, raising awareness of the business and its brands by communicating to retailers and decision makers across grocery, impulse and foodservice, via thought leadership, brand support and retailer engagement campaigns.

Danone UK & Ireland will continue to work with Ketchum, which handles consumer and corporate communications for its dairy, plant-based and baby-feeding brands. Freuds also has a global retainer for the Evian and Volvic brands.

Louise Robinson, customer category director for Danone UK & Ireland, said: “Clarion has a proven track record in delivering results. They are passionate and incredibly knowledgeable when it comes to the FMCG industry and their specialist trade communications knowledge, journalist relationships and capabilities are second-to-none. We had great chemistry from the off and we're really pleased to have them on board.”

Clarion managing partner Rebecca Wainwright, who heads up the B2B division, said: “Danone is a dream business for us. They have so much to offer with a powerful mission and it’ll be our job to lift the lid on its trade communications to help drive this from a trade engagement perspective.”