Crispin Porter + Bogusky joined leading brands and marketers at Advertising Week New York to discuss key business trends and issues shaping the industry across media, marketing, tech, and creativity. North America President Maggie Malek and Global CEO Brad Simms took the stage to dissect one of the largest topics facing agencies today: the future of an agency brand in the face of a consolidating landscape. The day after WPP announced the merger of VMLY&R and Wunderman Thompson into VML, Malek and Simms unpacked why we are investing in building back an iconic industry brand, as we continue to watch holding companies retire some of the hottest legacy shops.
“Clients come to us through a lot of different doors,” said Malek. “The key to integration goes beyond solely merging capabilities to solve business problems; it requires complementary cultures that bring passion and expertise to each project.”
The panel also addressed the importance of scale. As a global collective, Crispin’s size and structure mean that our partners benefit from smaller, more dedicated teams, while still having access to an active and engaged leadership who live and breathe their challenges on a daily basis.
“This opportunity we have is so rare,” said Simms. “While so many historic industry names are being jumbled together, we are embracing the Crispin legacy and devoting ourselves to reintroducing it for today.”
Both Simms and Malek were enthusiastic about Crispin’s ability to combine the like-minded passions of our integrated teams to best serve clients, and Simms summarized the agency’s mission simply:
“We don’t want to be everything to everybody, we want to be the best creative partners that we can be,” he said.