The rise and fall of Crispin Porter Bogusky: How the hottest ad agency lost its mojo - Business Insider

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The rise and fall of Crispin Porter Bogusky: How the hottest ad agency lost its mojo

CPB racked up awards and big-name clients like Arby's, Domino's and Burger King, which set precedent by disregarding the potential conflict of using the same agency as a rival. It was in such high demand that it famously refused to pitch business or take project-based work — practices unheard of in today'sBogusky was the agency's creative mastermind and cult-like leader, while other aspects of the business fell to other executives including Jeff Hicks, Jeff Steinhour, and Porter.

Bogusky's ideas went unquestioned, even if they seemed crazy, like when he left Miami and set up shop in Boulder in 2006 on a whim. Scores of people left high-paying jobs on the coasts to work with him, undeterred by CPB's reputation for low pay and 80-hour work weeks, said a former executive.

"We were such a cult of personality around Alex — like Steve Jobs at Apple — that when he left, it all eventually collapsed," a former partner and executive told Business Insider. "It was just set up to be really difficult for someone else to succeed in that role."Bogusky said that he had a succession plan when he left. But if he could do things differently, he would've negotiated having a board seat so he could have a say in the agency's decisions and trajectory.

Meantime, sources said, the agency didn't keep up with changing client needs and its holding company parent increasingly took the lead, contributing to its decline.Current and former employees said a major turning point for CPB was MDCand getting increasingly hands-on. As they saw it, MDC used CPB to fuel its ambitions and boost its bottom line.

 

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