Advertising Industry Archive

ValueClick’s Q4 results today were horrible, and they give the lie to the notion — propagated here on BNET, mea culpa — that the recession will leave the web advertising business unscathed. Its Q4 revenues were $150 million, down 15 percent from $175 million the year prior. The company recorded a loss of $256 million, based on a “goodwill impairment” charge of $327...

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Former DDB chief creative officer Lee Garfinkel has penned a column for Adweek addressing his detractors. Garfinkel was the subject of more than 250 comments on a run-of-the-mill news story that noted he was to be replaced as DDB’s top creative exec by BBDO’s Eric Silver. Most of those comments were searingly negative, personal, and vengeful. And, of course, written anonymously....

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Ad agencies are proud of their creative records, but every now and then they turn out some real stinkers. Here are advertising’s 10 biggest “what were they thinking” moments, as memorialized on YouTube. 1983 Apple Ad - Apple wasn’t always populated by design geniuses, as this ancient Apple industrial promo shows. In one priceless shot, it shows an executive using two...

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A lovely video of Rory Sutherland, vice-chairman of Ogilvy Group in the UK, has surfaced on YouTube in which he discusses what it would be like if WPP ran a strip club. The speech was given at an Ogilvy Digital Summit (see video below). He begins by describing these “dubious drinking institutions” and assuring his audience “I’ve never been there, I hasten to add.”...

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Publicis Groupe’s Q4 numbers successfully conceal the payment of $15.5 million to settle allegations that its Leo Burnett unit defrauded the U.S. Army (during a war!) by overbilling its recruitment ad account. There is no mention of the extraordinary expense in the numbers, out today, even though the full-year financials show much smaller amounts passing through Publicis’s income...

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An anti-child abuse ad created by TBWA in Australia makes a joke out of child abuse — its message: “If only it was this easy to get over child abuse.” The TV Spot opens as a father gives a speech at his daughter’s wedding reception. The script: Which brings me to my little princess. She was certainly good enough for me, if you know what I mean. … I look at Melissa...

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WPP’s new use of Ireland as its corporate HQ is even more of a sham than you thought it was. Here’s the Guardian’s description of WPP’s HQ on the Liffey in Dublin: WPP, one of the world’s biggest advertising companies, is one of those which says it is now controlled from Dublin. When we went to its headquarters, in a Georgian town house, it appeared to be...

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One takeaway from Omnicom’s Q4 earnings results is the depressing news that firing people works. To deal with the recession, Omnicom has laid off 3,500 people across its network of agencies. That reduced its operating expenses by 6 percent between Q3 and Q4. The result is that the revenue yield for every dollar Omnicom invested in salaries and office space went up, from $1.13 to $1.15....

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One of Bud Light’s ads in this year’s Super Bowl shows a man falling out of an office window onto the ground below — an act that bears an eerie resemblance to the suicide of a DDB executive who worked on Anheuser-Busch’s ads. Paul Tilley was executive creative director at DDB Chicago until his death in 2008. He jumped from his room at the Fairmont Hotel. DDB created the...

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Pepsi paid $1 million for its new logo (even though it looks a lot like other brands’ logos), but the details of exactly how Arnell Group justified that astonishing fee have remained hidden — until now. AgencySpy obtained a fantastic PDF of a work-in-progress document from Arnell on the logo. It takes several minutes to download (click here for the document) but is worth every...

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