As a kid, I was always puzzled by my Grandmother’s weekly shopping preferences.

They involved her travelling 12 stops on a bus in one direction to buy her bread and 5 stops in the other direction to buy her meat. Why, when both were widely accessible at a supermarket just a short walk from her house?

As I grew older, the answer became clear. To her, the cost and inconvenience was more than worth it for the quality of her purchase.

Apply that to media agencies and you could argue that the global networks are the Supermarkets, and the media indies are the boutique Butchers and Bakers.

But, in fairness, wasn’t my Nan simply pursuing excellence, not necessarily just in search of “niche”?

Agency independence doesn’t necessarily equate to superior quality, but just maybe it makes the word “bespoke” a little more achievable.

Perhaps the better media agency analogy is really about providing clients access to the finest assets – Talent, Systems and Service?

Once a client finds those all under one roof, then surely that makes the hunt for it all the more worthwhile?

Whilst I can’t say I’ll ever re-train as an Artisan Baker, what I do know, is that it’s high time our industry stopped commoditising media planning & buying and start focusing our efforts on delivering quality strategies that actually work.

If we did, I reckon more clients would be willing to travel further to buy our bread.

Paul Phelps

CEO