Plan A's Andrew Essex: 'The industry is ripe for reinvention'

What do you do after writing a book called “The End of Advertising?” If you’re Andrew Essex, you co-found an advertising company.  
 The advertising veteran launched Plan A last year, he says, with a different model in mind than the traditional holding company; “a leaner model, a lighter operating system.” Founded with MT Carney, Plan A is a collection of shops that includes Van’s General Store, Untitled Worldwide, Twin Studio and Beekman Social. 
 “It’s a new kind of holding company,” says Essex, a guest on this week’s Ad Lib podcast. “We tried to set up something that was an alternative for clients. They have two options right now: They can go to a Madison Avenue entity or they can hire a bunch of boutiques. Both have problems. So what’s a simpler model? Centralized account management and strategy and then allocate to a collection of boutiques who are best in class. But we give the client one [master service agreement] so it’s one throat to choke.” 
 At some point, he hopes to make acquisitions in the PR, or crisis communications space, and maybe voice. All of which invites the question: If he believes the advertising model is fundamentally broken, how does his holding company differentiate? For starters, he claims to stand out in stark contrast to another agency veteran launching a new collection of agencies: Martin Sorrell, who practically invented the model with WPP, beginning in 1985 and is starting from scratch at the age of 74 with his new venture S4.  
 “I... Continue reading at 'Advertising Age'

[ Advertising Age | 2019-09-12 09:00:00 UTC ]

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