For months there were rumblings in Calgary’s ad community of discontent at the newly merged Ogilvy & Mather/Young & Rubicam shop. They finally erupted like a small volcano last month, when Y&R creative director Phil Copithorne and account director Leigh Blakely jumped ship to another local agency, Karo. At the same time, two high-profile Y&R accounts-the Calgary Stampede and ATB Financial-transferred their work to Karo.
Copithorne and Blakely declined to discuss their depature and the agency responses were standard issue. “People come and people go, clients come and clients go, it’s the nature of our business,” said Robert Hocking, senior VP at Y&R. Across town, Karo president Chris Bedford said his agency is “always looking for the best talent we can find.”
But these explanations leave unanswered questions: Why did the Calgary Stampede remove its business from Y&R only 13 months after selecting it in an intensive review process? Why have several former O&M employees left since the agency merged with its WPP cousin Y&R in January 2006? And will Y&R invoke non-compete clauses to prevent Copithorne and Blakely from working on the Stampede and ATB business?
Employees moving to another agency is commonplace in the advertising business. What focused the spotlight on events at Y&R was the Stampede’s decision to move its business, seemingly overnight. In Calgary, the Stampede is more than an account, it’s an icon, explains Steve Williams, now CD with Venture Communications but previously with the Stampede’s longtime former agency, Highwood. “The minute an RFP goes out on a client like that, everyone is trying to get on the list.” And when that client unexpectedly switches agencies, everybody wants to know why.
According to Brenda Hanchar, media marketing manager for the Stampede, the decision wasn’t sudden at all. She says the Stampede had been reviewing its options regarding Y&R for several months because of “changes to services such as creative services and account services capabilities.” That surprises Hocking, who says his agency hasn’t altered its offerings, and with 500 employees and five offices across Canada, Y&R has “the ability to gear up quickly for any account.”
Either way, three of the five clients that came to the agency in the O&M merger-the Stampede, ATB Financial and First Calgary Financial-have now left. Neither of the remaining O&M clients-Enbridge and the Jockey Club-would confirm their status. Despite the business losses, Hocking says there have been no layoffs.
However, a number of former O&M employees in addition to Copithorne and Blakely have left Y&R over the last year because of what Hocking calls a culture clash. Former O&M Calgary president Mark Piggot, who worked with Stampede VP of marketing Laurie Schild during her stints at Canadian Airlines and Telus, remains at Y&R, but will leave when his contract expires in March. Says Hocking: “O&M in Calgary had a different way of doing business. I spent a lot of time (since his arrival from Toronto last fall) working to bring the two cultures together, but there were certain individuals who were not a good fit for Y&R Calgary.”
The turmoil is subsiding but threatens to erupt again if Copithorne and Blakely work with ATB and the Stampede at Karo. Contractual clauses prohibiting employees from working for clients for six months after their employment ends are “standard” in the industry and Hocking says “we will definitely be enforcing these clauses.”
