Big US ad agency takes Reddit revenge on client for sexist, abusive behaviour

A Reddit post telling the story of an agency that got its client fired was picked up by Adweek’s Agency Spy.

The anonymous writer says he works at a “big” agency, and his story involves the agency’s biggest client, who they nicknamed “Baseball Dad” because he was “the type of neckless marshmellow who gets wasted at his kid’s baseball game and starts heckling the other kids. Just a boorish asshole.”

MrGrieves787 tells how the sexist client used to call female workers “sweetheart” while commenting openly on their clothes and bodies; then frequently abuse the agency staff by telling them to shut up while reminding them he could fire them any time.

The final straw came when Baseball Dad told a project manager that she should “worry less about budgets and more about wearing ‘that nice top’ you wore at our last presentation.”

So the agency team started recording calls with the client and made up a compilation of every “sweetheart,” “shut up,” and “no one cares what you think.” They even had a “you’re much better at flirting than budgets, sweetheart. That’s why I like you” to use as evidence.

The recording was sent to Baseball Dad’s boss with a threat to walk away from the work two weeks before a new product launch if the offender wasn’t disciplined.

He was fired immediately, but the revenge didn’t stop there. One of the women who had born the brunt of the offensive behaviour sent the recording to Baseball Dad’s wife.

That might have been taking it a bit far, but who can blame her?