In the past decade, consolidation has been the name of the game in India’s advertising industry. On an average, the past two years have seen a major acquisition taking place every two months, according to industry estimates. Today, close to 90% of the advertising business (by revenue) is dominated by advertising giants such as WPP Group Plc., Omnicom Group Inc., Publicis Groupe and Interpublic Group of Companies, Inc.
In the midst of all this, some creative professionals have chosen to opt out of the big-name and big-ticket client game. They have quit their cushy jobs and given up their corner offices to set up their own creative outfits.
Says Ramesh Ramanathan, former creative director of Saatchi and Saatchi Pvt. Ltd, and the most recent addition to the tribe of boutique advertising professionals: “Advertising is not what it used to be. With the number of multinationals in the market, agencies are getting too profit driven, and creativity is being ignored.”
After a 24-year career in big agencies, Ramanathan claims he is one of the many creative-driven ad guys for whom “frustration set in, and the thought ‘let me do it my way’ surfaced”.
Mint interviewed 12 professionals who have launched, or are in the process of launching, their own agencies.
While their reasons vary, there were three complaints in common: strangulation of creative freedom, fragmentation of advertising into various parallels such as buying, planning and creative, and sales gaining dominance over creativity in day-to-day work.
Among the front-runners is Alok Nanda, who quit after 15 years at Grey Worldwide to start Alok Nanda Co. He says: “The country is growing economically and secondly, clients are waking up to specialist needs—I actually think there is a market for a creative shop to specialize just in TV graphics, for instance.” In seven years, the agency has built up an impressive client list that includes Google Inc., Marico Ltd and the Taj group of hotels.
Pushpinder Singh, who was the national creative director of Ambience Publicis, launched Saints and Warriors Communications Pvt. Ltd in 2006. The agency has built a reputation for bold and unconventional advertising.
In the past two years, agencies such as Ideas@Work Advertising Pvt. Ltd, CreativeLand Asia, Aqua Communications Pvt. Ltd, Cartwheel Creative Consultancy Pvt. Ltd and Brand Portrait Consulting Pvt. Ltd have cemented the trend of boutique advertising agencies with remarkable success. And 2008 is likely to see the launch of several new independent outfits.
However, say those in the industry, it’s only a matter of time before the consolidation trend catches up with these agencies too and global advertising giants start bidding for them.