Creative agencies are in danger of becomking an endangered species as the ad world reorganises under the likes of Omnicom Advertising Group and WPP Creative. Publicis, which has relatively fewer creatives compared to the others, is better at keeping these things hidden under the bonnet.
Proof of the decline, if it’s needed, comes from the latest UK IPA Census which shows enployment in creative agencies down 14.3%, and only down marginally in media agencies, with media employees now neck and neck with creative at IPA agencies, once the sole presere of crewtive. Yet media agenices are the ones supposedly at the mercy of AI.
UK Agency Employment
IPA director general Paul Bainsfair says: “Headcount is down, churn is up and the steep fall in entry-level roles raises real questions about future capability, particularly as AI reshapes skills and ways of working.” and “Keeping talent pipelines open, including making far better use of apprenticeships and the Apprenticeship Levy, is no longer optional. Agencies that continue to invest in early careers, skills development and retention will be best placed to build resilient businesses and a workforce fit for the future.”
Future capability is the key unless adland is to succumb to AI entirely. The overal standard of UK creativity is dire: how much of this is down to client briefs and how much to sheer lack of expertise we know not although the latter is surely a factor.
But one highly successful adman who hails from a better era (10 to 15 years ago) remarked the other day that “no-one half decent” would plump for a career in a creative agency now.
