DraftFCB appoints Alistair Ross to “think of shit” position
February 17, 2010
DraftFCB has appointed VCCP’s Alistair Ross to the newly created role of head of ideas. Ross will be responsible for helping to devise ideas across the agency’s range of accounts. According to Campaign Live
Huh? His job is to sit there and think of shit. That’s awesome! What an incredible use of resources. To have someone get paid to sit there and think of ideas when the creatives are being fired and laid off left and right.
Clearly we are in the wrong position. Every advertising agency needs a “think of shit” position. It pays 6 figures and you get a lofty desk.
This is exactly what advertising has come down to. Companies pay big dollars to have him think of shit.
If this doesn’t make anyone in the industry upset then nothing will, life is good move on.
Ad Agency Draft/FCB loses ALL of Starbucks
October 22, 2009
George Parker is reporting that Draft/FCB has lost all of Starbucks, and pink slips are being handed out like Halloween candy at the advertising agency.
Evidently this has been swept under the rug as both Starbucks and Draft/FCB have refused to confirm or deny this report. If you have any information regarding this, please contact us your anonymity is guaranteed.
This is going to be a trend for some time, as the unemployment rate has reached 17% in the US, and since advertising is generally considered by companies as a discretionary spend, as urgent matters such as payroll tend to take precedence.
Let’s face it, Advertising Agencies in general are parasites, we only do well when other firms come up with good ideas that are sellable… then it’s our job to advertise those products that other people invented… so when they are having a rough time..so do we.
We are unsure how many people were canned at Draft/FCB , however the rumors are that it’s measured in the dozens.
George Parker declares war on MediaBistro
December 30, 2008
Advertising Agency industry Veteran George Parker has officially declared war on MediaBistro. The title of the post is called “Is MediaBistro a bigger scam than Draft/FCB!”
The comments that follow are enormously embarrassing. The problem we have here is that personally we feel that MediaBistro is the problem, not the individual bloggers.
For the longest time we have offered to fix the site, SEO it properly, and add proper Social Media aspects to the site, ensure an easy comment system….. at one point we offered to help them virtually for free.
The individual bloggers there were 100% on board, management however was not. They seem to think that they can do it alone, leveraging their other bloggers within their network to do inter-promotion between blogs. Sort of like taking two broken cars, and hoping to cobble together one that works.
It’s not a valid solution, but what do we know…. we’re just a bunch of tech marketing geeks that code for a living…
Trying to turn a dime on that network of sites with advertising during the great depression is going to be difficult to say the least…
Chris Miller jumps ship – joins DraftFCB
September 15, 2008
Talk about jumping… Chris Miller dumps Element 79 .. goes to DraftFCB ..
Agency spy had goods last week… but today it’s confirmed..
Lehman Brothers employees told to bring a duffel bag to work
September 15, 2008
It’s ugly out there. This banking meltdown WILL cause serious problems for all industries, including the advertising agency space. Companies facing a credit crunch will cut down on advertising dollar spent, and that will directly translate to layoffs in our industry.
(10:05:03 AM) YYYYY: how’s your lehman brothers stock doing?
(10:05:38 AM) XXXX: a buddy of mine works there
(10:05:42 AM) XXXX: well
(10:05:47 AM) XXXX: for the rest of today at least
(10:05:57 AM) XXXX: he was told to wear casual clothes and bring a duffel bag
At least they didn’t do what DraftFCB did… told people they were moving desks then canned them..
The problem here is that you can’t have companies not have access to credit.. I know on the personal banking side a colleague of mine could not get a 10,000 dollar loan with an OVER 800 credit score… because the loan officer said “we’re denying everyone” ….
Companies are facing the same problem.. No loans.. no money open to them.. clients slow in paying because they can’t get credit themselves.. then they face meeting payroll or an ad campaign… they’ll choose the payroll.
Lehman Brothers is only the tip of the iceburg in the news as well today, AIG is going directly to the federal reserve asking for 40-50 billion dollars…. directly from the Federal Reserve… so if the Feds print up the money and hand it to AIG you’re looking at increased inflation..
This problem isn’t going away… and it’s going to get worse..
DraftFCB – Delivering the Perfect Balance Of Creativity and Accountability
August 18, 2008
DraftFCB - Delivering the Perfect Balance Of Creativity and Accountability
It appears that DraftFCB has a new slogan for Adwords, and it’s an interesting copy to say the least.
Because accountability appeared to be missing in 2006 spilling into 2007 for example:
“Earlier today we notified Draft FCB that we decided to reopen the bid process for our advertising account and that it will not be eligible to participate,” Wal-Mart spokesperson Mona Williams told BusinessWeek.com. “It is the result of new information we’ve obtained over the past few weeks.” Williams declined to elaborate further on the nature of that new information.
Full Story
However this was that new information:
Wal-Mart’s biggest initial complaint about Roehm, as the company fired her in late 2006, was that she had violated corporate policy and accepted gifts–plus a complimentary Aston Martin joyride from DraftFCB–the ad agency to which she soon awarded Wal-Mart’s $580 million account.
Then of course the kicker:
Remember: It’s the whale that comes to the surface that gets harpooned.
From the Open Letter from Business Week to Walmart , Julie Roehm and DraftFCB
DraftFCB, change your Adwords copy.. it’s way too soon to start touting Accountability after the Wal-mart Disaster.
DraftFCB : we can’t see outside our elite box
April 30, 2008
Classic!! DraftFCB hangs themselves into boxes that blind them and can’t see outside the box.
Yes, yes.. ideas are moving. In big, square, clunky brown boxes, which staffers can’t see out of. That sounds about right for Draft, no? Credit : AgencySpy
These guys are an ad agency right? Just making sure.
boycott brewing against Draft/FCB
April 21, 2008
It appears that the Draft/FCB advertising agency might be facing a boycott themselves and some of the clients they represent regarding this 9/11 ad. George Parker has some of the details, however there appears to be a boycott movement brewing online regarding this. They have launched this ad in South Africa right now … in which some are stating it’s nothing more than exploiting the death 3000 Americans…..
Click image to enlarge, click again to enlarge further.
Advertising Agency: DraftFCB, South Africa
Creative Directors: Rob Mclennan, Grant Jacobsen
Art Directors: Grant Jacobsen, Marcus Moshapalo
Copywriters: James Dodd, Grant Jacobsen, Grant Sithole
Illustrator: AmICollective
Published: March 2008
Did DraftFCB bribe Wal-Mart in 2006?
March 26, 2008
For example, Roehm’s biggest mistake after Wal-Mart hired her away from a marketing post at Chrysler in early 2006 was thumbing her nose unnecessarily at parts of Wal-Mart culture that really were irrelevant to what she was hired to do: shake up marketing. Wal-Mart’s biggest initial complaint about Roehm, as the company fired her in late 2006, was that she had violated corporate policy and accepted gifts–plus a complimentary Aston Martin joyride from DraftFCB–the ad agency to which she soon awarded Wal-Mart’s $580 million account.
Amazing stuff…. truly amazing… We don’t know what is worse… Wal-Mart executives that took bribes… or DraftFCB being forced to pay bribes to get business… something that they lost eventually anyway to Saatchi & Saatchi due to the bribe (you don’t have to call it a bribe… you can call it an Aston Martin if you want).
Draftfcb just doesn’t understand interactive / digital / online marketing
March 21, 2008
The website, www.draftworldwide.com has been down for some time… we are talking a significant amount of time. Google has indexed it multiple times as a Windows error message.
Of course you can click on the thumbs to get to an image page, (you can actually click on the image there to get full screen)
And this is what the site looks like if you visit it.
It’s pretty embarrassing on multiple levels. Archive.org reports that the site did exist at one point… and just ‘vanished’..
See the problem with this is that it is ranked in Google for their name (yea it’s ranked on page one without the space as well)… it states much if an Advertising Agency can’t keep their own sites up…. how can they keep a clients sites up? It’s just poor decisions in our opinion.
Also it’s a PR nightmare, for a firm that states they do PR, how could they have Google Results like this, in our opinion Google is the definition of online PR.
We don’t think we are being hard on them, it’s worth noting we noticed this problem some time ago… but severs go down… a short downtime is one thing… days upon days down is another. Plus who in their right mind hosts a production site on a Windows Platform that doesn’t require it?
Here is their whois output (yes they own the site)
Administrative Contact :
DraftWorldwide
webadmin@draftnet.com
919 3rd Ave 14th Floor
Ney York, NY 10022
US
Phone: 212 546 8300
Fax: 212 546 7801Technical Contact :
goldstein, brian
bgoldstein@DRAFTNET.COM
919 3RD AVE FL 14
NEW YORK, NY 10022-3902
US
Phone: 212-546-8341
Fax: 212-546-7812Record expires on 21-Oct-2010
Record created on 22-Oct-1997
Database last updated on 11-Oct-2006Domain servers in listed order: Manage DNS
NS1.TRUENORTH.COM 199.221.98.5
NS2.TRUENORTH.COM 204.149.81.10
It could be a DNS issue (it’s pointed to the wrong place), the server it technically up or else we wouldn’t have gotten that IIS message.
We at the tribble advertising agency are offering to help them get their online marketing straight if they want.
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