The Rise of the Indies Part Two: The Indies Strike Back

“We were young enough to fear nothing, and just experienced enough to think we could actually pull it off.” 

Those were the words spoken by founder of the Melbourne based independent agency, SickDogWolfMan, James Orr To attribute that quote to anything but pure poetry would be a disservice. It also encapsulates the rise of the independent agencies perfectly. 

With the idea fresh in their minds, James and Jess Wheeler, CD at SDWM thought they could create a better relationship between advertising communication and brand design if they were to just “pull the ripcord” and well, see what happened. With a convincing amount of expertise and the right amount of naivety, they knew SDWM was going to be something that was going to allow them to fall in love with the work again.

“They want to work with ‘us’, not a faceless global acronym. They don’t have to go through multiple layers. It’s not different people swanning into every meeting. When they have a problem, we all sit down together and solve it. It might not be the right setup for everybody, but we’re winning business in a tough economy so it’s clearly resonating,” Jess said.

Following this notion of wanting to be more involved in the action, Jaimes Leggett, founder of Today the Brave, while working for a network agency felt himself becoming further removed from the creative work. As a result, he felt an ever-growing tug to be closer to creativity.

“Most of us work in advertising because we believe that creativity builds brands. It’s fun; we work in creative environments, with interesting people doing stuff that makes us think. Today, more than ever, clients are looking for their agencies to remain nimble, and to have the capacity to flex from the traditional way of doing things to reflect evolving requirements,” he said.

Arguing for the importance of culture and attitude over process and scale, he made a point of noting that clients are not asking for independent agencies but rather, agencies that are nimble. And being on a smaller scale allows for that willingness to experiment.

Steve Jackson, co-founder of the agency Milk and Honey held the notion that more ‘senior’ people within network agencies are inspired to take the leap and start their own shop to have more control over their futures. “For one reason or another, many of the network agencies aren't the safe haven for senior people they once were…the times are right for indies. The industry is going through so much change and, naturally, by questioning the regular ways of doing things, there's going to be lots of fresh ideas about how things can be done differently. After all, where there's chaos there's opportunity!" he added.

Whereas Justin Drape, co-founder of Exceptional ALIEN, sees the rise of independent agencies as history repeating itself. With the history of economic downturns having a track record of leading to innovation, he believes the pressure and constraint that is being put on the industry as a whole will drive people to be brave, creative, and entrepreneurial.

“And in those times, only the best ideas will survive and thrive. The larger networks are good at being everything to everyone, but there is always a group of ambitious and brave clients who have the desire to work with specialist studios who are just really great at the discipline(s) they’re passionate about.” he said.  

Ben Lilley, founder of HERO, believes there has to be a certain amount of stupidity involved in walking away from a role at a network agency and leaning into something that will bring personal fulfilment. However, he also believes that it is far more satisfying and creatively liberating to have one’s own agency.

“And that has to be the primary reason anyone does it. Because it's definitely not easy and often isn't so glamorous. And if the motivation is for any other reason than wanting to do the best work of your career - if you're driven instead by the desire for money, or control or anything else - your agency won't survive” he said.

Earlier, a quote from SDWM’s James was used to describe the rise of independents and although, it still perfectly illustrates the feeling of creating one’s own agency, after gathering the thoughts and opinions from even more founders, it is clear that the perfect mixture of naivety and experience isn’t the most common path towards independence.

Milk and Honey’s very own, Steven, however, said something that will resonate with many. A common theme that has been said in more words and in less, he concluded; 

“I think we're seeing a rise of independence, not just the rise of the independents."