Aint’s Jorg Riommi: who really benefits from mega-mergers?

Are advertising mega-mergers really serving clients or shareholders?

Looks like there is no end in sight for the saga of the mega-mergers. Ten years or so after the Omnicom/Publicis Groupe attempt, plus the many other mergers in last few years within WPP that killed a few historic creative brands, the struggle for size and dominance (or rather relevance and survival?) among the big corps sees a new dramatic chapter with this week’s news.

In some ways it’s not too much of a surprise, given the evolution of the market in last years. The constant compression of the business, competition from Meta, Google, X and the other big techs of the world and now the whole AI wave have all been major contributors.

But it just seems that the big advertising players are not quite happy to be what they are, and want to be something else.

I don’t mean that they should keep a stiff identity in an ever changing world. Of course change needs change. It’s just – what kind of change is needed?

Transforming by fully giving up its own identity and own reason to be, and emulating tech companies or consultancies seems to only make big advertising holding companies weaker in comparison. Less confident in what they really are and what they really can give.

One word that’s often lacking in official press releases when these mergers happen is creativity – the very essence and DNA of ad agencies.

It has become more and more about data, tech, and innovation – which surely is all good and badly needed, no question. But what do we do with it, if we let ideas become less relevant and central? It becomes an emotional wasteland.

Do clients really need huge impersonal volume and political behemoths? I can’t help but feel that the race to size and hype may ultimately leave some of the most important stones unturned for them.

Do the big ad players really believe that one can mix and match their once unique creative brands, and not come across as insincere when talking about the uniqueness of branding?

Do the big ad players really believe that giving up on the creative DNA will make them better equipped to provide that expertise? Perhaps they are not bothered and are too busy with quarterly reports. But this might come back to haunt them.

Omnicom/IPG is not Make America Great Again, it’s Make America

What clients really need are the best ideas, attention, specialized care and closeness. They need dedicated committed teams, not spread thinly. They need specialized quality. And they need it now, more than ever.

These are the same things creativity needs, the same things the talent in our industry needs and the same things value needs. Some clients will get it too. Many already are and many more will, outside the holding companies.

That is why this is the very best time to be creative and be independent. So, dear clients, go indie. Might cost you less but get you more.

Jorg Riommi is the founder of independent creative agency Ain’t. He is a former CCO of Publicis East Europe