Three years after starting their own agency they’re still living on cat food.
It’s very easy to be a man of principle when you’re a creative person working in a nice,
big agency on a nice, fat salary.
You can politely lecture clients who think the best way to build brands is to stack ten
lucky draw coupons on top of each other in the one print advertisement.
Berate management whose vision for the agency rarely extends beyond the balance sheet
that lands on their desk every quarter.
As well as belittle account executives who couldn’t distinguish the creative merit of a
D&AD Gold from a dubbed Latin American weight loss informercial.
Safe in the knowledge that, at the very worst, you’ll end up on the street.
Probably with more money than you would have saved if you’d slogged it out for another
three years.
Makes you wonder why any creative would bother setting up his own shop, doesn’t it?
And, to be perfectly frank, very few worth their salt actually do.
Not in Asia and certainly not in Malaysia.
So when Omar and Thomas decided to open OT three years ago there were many who
thought them a tad misguided.
A theory that gained significant momentum two days later when the entire Asian
economy went kaput and they found themselves with no clients and enough money to
keep them in instant noodles for three weeks.
Which brings us back to the somewhat sticky question of principles.
Specifically, whether or not they were tempted to completely abandon them.
You know, sacrifice art for profit. Or, at least, a plate of Char Kway Teow.
Well, if the truth be known, they did the occasional menu design when they were really
hungry.
But, by and large, they we were able to continue worshipping at the altar of creativity,
even if they had the sneaking suspicion they were being sacrificed like goats on top of it.
Not out of stubbornness. Or blind pride.
But because they knew that to do otherwise would have been commercial suicide.
For their clients.
Yes, despite what you may have heard, creative advertising isn’t an indulgence that’s best
saved for funeral parlour campaigns a month before the cut-off date for the Kancil
awards.
Combined with a sound strategy it has been known to actually work.
Perhaps we ought to give you a few examples lest you find it difficult to grasp such a
radical concept.
First up.
Bali.
Before OT’s launch campaign it was an island in Indonesia.
Now it’s a nightclub in PJ.
Then there was the office property launch Omar and Thomas orchestrated for the same
client. Sold out in two months and this when most landlords were having trouble giving
away space to create the false impression that at least someone was willing to move in.
Remember the print ad for the Malaysia Nanban Tamil newspaper?
Research showed that ninety percent of those living in metropolitan KL did, of which
only 10 percent actually understood Tamil!
We could go on.
But this advertisement isn’t a treatise on the value of sticking to one’s principles, or the
inspiring story of a couple of local boys who made good or any other such thing.
Actually, it’s to announce something which will no doubt strike you as running contrary
to everything we’ve gone to great pains to explain here.
Omar and Thomas have just sold out the hypocrites!
Yep. To us at D’Arcy KL. And for quite a bundle too, if you really must know.
In their defense (and we feel obliged to defend them now that most of us are going to be
working under them) it should be noted that we weren’t the first agency to approach them
by any means.
Or the agency that waved the biggest wad of cash under their noses.
But rather the only one they could hop into bed with and not wake up every morning
feeling they’d been, well... you can probably guess the rest.
So now Omar is our managing director and Thomas our associate regional creative
director.
Where they’re not only on packages you couldn’t fit into a Jumbo Box.
But also working for a worldwide network that comprises 131 offices in 75 countries and
last year alone racked up (US) 5.6 billion in billings.
On accounts like Whiskas (that’s the headline finally explained), Procter & Gamble,
Hyatt, The Australian Tourist Commission, Bristol-Myers Squibb and Philips, to name
but a few.
With a group of people who have not only won a bunch of awards themselves but who
also know how to sell such work to real clients.
The advertising equivalent, if you will, of not only having your cake and eating it too but
also getting a date with the girl that jumped out of it.
And proof, if ever there was any, that it’s possible to sell out without selling your
principles or your soul.
If you’d like to know more contact Omar at D’Arcy KL on (603) 705 1988.