Advertising, ad campaigns, ad agencies, and the people that make it happen

It’s bad enough when agencies butcher the English language on behalf of their clients, usually because that’s the kind of CorporateSpeak the clients use all the time, but there’s no excuse when agencies do it for themselves. Today’s announcement that Stephen Gatfield, EVP of strategy and network operations at Interpublic Group, will take on operational duties at Lowe to help the agency “Reposition itself as a smaller creatively driven shop,” is a perfect example of this kind of bull----. Why can’t they be honest and simply admit that the shop has lost so much business recently, and failed dismally in every new business pitch it’s been involved in, that the agency, is not “repositioning itself”… It’s fighting for its life. At least that would be honest!