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Army, Its Recruiting Not All It Could Be, Decides to Overhaul Its Advertising

With recruiters struggling to fill its ranks and with public perceptions of its role apparently blurring, the Army plans to overhaul its advertising and marketing campaign, among other steps ending its contract with Young & Rubicam after 12 years.

The most immediate and perceptible effect of the changes, which the Army announced today, may be the demise of ''Be All That You Can Be,'' its slogan for two decades but one that officials said might no longer
attract the enlistees the service desperately needs.

'' 'Be All You Can Be' is a great slogan,'' said P. T. Henry, assistant secretary of the Army for manpower and reserve affairs. ''It is the trademark of the Army, known around the world, and it has served the Army well. The question is, Is it the right slogan today to recruit young men and women for the Army of the 21st century?''

Officials have had a difficult time putting their finger on what it is about the slogan, or its intended audience, that makes for a fit that is not quite
comfortable. They simply have a general sense that the motto does not seize today's young people, and that the service could also do a better job of marketing its mission to older people -- ''influencers,'' as they are called -- who might steer the young toward an Army career.

The Army's announcement underscored the nagging difficulties all the armed services are having signing up recruits at a time when the economy is booming and more young people than ever are finding college an attainable goal. Despite higher bonuses and grants for tuition, the services' recruiters have been scrambling, often unsuccessfully, to meet their recruiting goals in recent years.

In the fiscal year ended Sept. 30, the Army missed its goal of 74,500 recruits by 6,291, an 8 percent shortfall, while the Air Force was shy of its goal of 32,673 by 1,727, or 5 percent. A year before, the Navy fell short by nearly 12 percent.

Young & Rubicam took over the Army's advertising campaign in 1987 and built on the ''Be All That You Can Be'' motto, which had been developed seven years earlier by the advertising agency N. W. Ayer. Now the
secretary of the Army, Louis Caldera, has decided to exercise the Army's option not to renew the Young & Rubicam contract when it expires on July 31.

The current contract, worth about $14 million a year, was negotiated in 1997. It provided for an initial year plus four options of one year each. Had the Army kept renewing, the contract would have continued into the
summer of 2002.

The Army, whose move was first reported in The Wall Street Journal today, said it would now invite major advertising agencies to bid for a new contract that would link payment to measurable results in enlistment
increases. The Army has hired a consulting firm, Jones-Lundin Associates of Chicago, to help in the search.

The service said it hoped Young & Rubicam would compete for the new contract. But officials at the agency sounded irked by the Army's handling of the matter, particularly its decision to make a contract-termination announcement now -- seven months before the end of the current option year -- rather than use some of that time to work with the agency to
bolster the campaign.

''We have not made a decision yet as to whether we'll take part as the Army recompetes the contract,'' said Bill Kelly, managing partner for the agency's U.S. Army Group. ''We're not balking at recompeting. That's a
fact of life for a government contract.''

But he added, ''We have real issues with the process and the timing.''

While the Army's step is the most drastic so far, all the services have begun to rethink their advertising and marketing strategies after several years of recruiting difficulties.

No longer content with public service announcements, the Air Force last year began paying for television advertisements for the first time. So far the service has spent $29 million in the current fiscal year to put them on the air, though officials say it is too early to tell whether those spots have helped bolster enlistments.

And last fall the Navy took the unusual step of mailing letters to 65,000 retired sailors and officers, asking them to consider rejoining.

The Army's changes grew in part from a study completed last fall for Secretary of Defense William S. Cohen by two prominent political consultants: Carter D. Eskew, a Democrat, and Michael R. Murphy, a Republican. The study criticized the services, saying that in addition
to a failure to articulate their mission, they had spent advertising dollars inefficiently -- by broadcasting advertisements on telecasts of national
sports events, for example, rather than taking aim at niche markets on syndicated or cable programs. The consultants recommended that the services conduct better research on young people in order to direct their advertising at a variety of young audiences.

The Army announced today that it was creating a marketing division to do just that. It also plans to hire market research firms to devise ways to learn more about attitudes and tastes of young people so that its
advertising budget, which has risen to $115 million from $85 million two years ago, is better spent.

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