Large corp. clients moving toward smaller, boutique firms

[CHRISGEE]

Great article in the NYTimes (http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/09/business/media/09adco.html?ex=1281240000&en=4e9e140ccbc4f8c9&ei=5090&partner=rssuserland&emc=rss). These such articles are becoming more frequent as large corporations, who have traditionally favored equally large creative firms, have increasingly been more willing to work with smaller, boutique firms.

[morea]

interesting read! Thanks for sharing.

[PrintDriver]

I could use a firm bootycue...
:D

You are gonna see a bunch of jaded big-ass ad agencies sit up and notice this if it is really a trend. Polish off your most rad resumes and get em out there.

Old Navy saying they "liked it well enough to produce it and [air it] isn't exactly a glowing statement...LOL.

[CHRISGEE]

Well I saw this trend beginning when I used to work at a big agency. To be sure, few big agencies are actually big agencies anymore. Most are much smaller than you'd ever imagine, when it comes to the core group of individuals who work on projects.

I also think this trend was accelerated by the massive layoffs after the dot-com bubble burst. Many former agency creatives were laid-off and then brought back in a consulting role to service clients. Restrained by contracts from being able to pillage their former agency clients, once the important decision-makers began to move to other companies themselves and were no longer barred by such constratints, they began to call the consultants directly rather than the large agency.

Clients aren't stupid. They see that large agencies are keeping very lean staffs and brining in consultants or partnering with smaller shops on an as-needed basis. Cutting out the middle man can often result in not having to pay the huge agency mark-up for the SAME CREATIVE!

[brendanwor]

Always good to hear! Great read :)

[GreenThumb]

Last week, we pitched a very prominent law firm. I felt like stabbing myself when the marketing lady there said "we dont deal with an agency that is less than 50 people out of principle--we want at least 50 people working on our account"

Irony is they needed a static 12 page website. Im sure 50 people will work extremely hard to achieve that.

[CHRISGEE]

It sucks that they wasted your time like that, GreenThumb. 50 people, eh? There are many prominent design firms and agencies who do not have that many people working for them.

At my old agency, even for a static 12 website we probably would have charged $30K, simply because the cost of "getting out of bed" really didn't make sense for us to work for much less. LOL!

[LancasterJohn]

I really think that a lot of the larger firms wanted a big name agency just to please their shareholders, without a thought as to what it is that they're really getting.

[JaCkinbOx]

See, that's what's wrong with lawyers.

What is it about white-color folks having their head up their butt?

[LancasterJohn]

Hopefully there will be a "head-removal" trend. I suspect the lawyers will be the last to adopt it though.

[CHRISGEE]

See, that's what's wrong with lawyers.

What is it about white-color folks having their head up their butt?

It's part of the reason we don't do work with law firms, really. I don't know why but for some reason many law firms tend to be myopic like that. But they're also, as an industry, very much no-frills and I suspect the law firm in question won't be paying much money to a large agency to do their site either.

[NewEra]

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