October 29, 2025 | SIGN UP
Michael Bürgi
SENIOR EDITOR, MEDIA BUYING AND PLANNING
It's fun and fascinating to cover the agency holding companies, who are in a pitched battle for the soul (and marketing budgets) of the largest advertisers out there. But in many ways the real innovation among agencies is happening among the smaller independent shops, of which there are hundreds if not thousands that dot the marketing landscape.
Thanks to the surge in affordable technology (more than just AI, which is currently dominating every headline and pitch), independents can now offer in some more compact form similar abilities to the holdcos. Whether it's in sophisticated research, updated and timely marketing mix models, wildly innovative creative, or strategic approaches to design, indies can get the job done. Unlike the holdcos, they may not be able to offer all of them under one roof, but they're also not burdened by the weight of all that under one roof.
I focused on four such New York-based agencies, who to me embody the modern spirit of what Mad Men tried to capture about the 1960s (albeit Mad Men also did a great job of showing the corrupt underbelly of that supposedly idyllic era). What stood out the most to me about these four agencies was the common theme of refusing to work with asshole clients. Most agencies are usually in such a state that they need to take on whichever client wants them, asshole or not. Here's hoping the business stays healthy enough in times of massive change that they don't have to bend that rule.
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