In this issue's Regional Report on Canada we look at a Grip Limited, a new agency spearheaded by an unhappy client: Labatt. Apologies to Canadians who have been hearing more about this story than they could have ever wanted to in their most wildly tedious nightmares (there hasn't been this much hooha since a Canadian trade mag ran an ad with sexual references. I know - the horror). The brewer had famously expressed dissatisfaction with the agency world status quo and the flawed business model inherent in the network-affiliated agency. Years earlier, Labatt made similar sorts of noises when then president Hugo Powell gave a speech to the Canadian Congress of Advertisers in which he decried the "handlers" that he saw overrunning the ad business. In an oration that's become part of Canadian ad lore, Powell ranted against the employment of layers of people who "handled" ad processes while ostensibly contributing little to the actual work of making strategy and ads.

Last fall, the beermaker pulled its business out of Ammirati Puris, the shop that had been awarded the plum assignment shortly after Powell's speech and which had worked on the account for seven years. Rather than take the account to another of Toronto's fine advertising concerns, Labatt undertook the creation of a new shop, one which would be a creative-heavy yet pared-down version of what it thought an agency should be. The resultant shop, Grip, does boast a dreamy coterie of creatives and is pronouncing itself a purveyor of "world class advertising for less." And even though this slogan sounds uneasily like a grocery's store's (just substitute "produce" for "advertising") the point is made. But what does this "model" offer that another independent shop doesn't? Labatt's marketing brass echoed Powell's "fire the handlers" complaint as motivation for the move as well as pointing a finger at the revenue-draining characteristics of a network agency. "We had a quite complex marketing structure before - we had multiple layers within the marketing department," says Labatt VP marketing Charles Oliver. "We've taken steps internally to make the decision-making process faster. Now we're asking agencies to do the same on their side." Says Oliver: "At the end of the day advertising and the process of advertising is about taking consumer insight, driving that insight into advertising briefs and then basically turning it over to an agency and saying come up with some great ideas to deliver against the brief. Typically, large agencies can drag that process into long, drawn-out multi-layered discussions."

Labatt should certainly be applauded for devoting energy to figuring out the ad process and the move should be noted by agencies big and small. What's not clear is how this is really a new model (flat hierarchies and payment by results exist at other shops) or what Labatt is getting that it couldn't get at any other smaller creative shop without the specific risks it's taking (creating a new culture being one risk - an assembly of men who must gel into a team and who will be, at the outset working for only one client). But, if you've spent any time on the Canadian ad scene you've heard enough people say that not enough risks are taken here and sometimes a big move is what's needed.

A bientot, mes chères saucisses!

Teressa Iezzi

Editor