Owning the Ad

Ad agency Anomaly is pioneering a new model whereby it provides its creative services in return for a take of the profits. It's a high-risk strategy that could change the industry

by Douglas MacMillan

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Marketers have little reason to care about the performance of a campaign after the client doles out their fee. Take graphic designer Rob Janoff: Working for Silicon Valley marketing firm Regis McKenna in the late 1970s, he created the corporate logo for fledgling tech startup Apple Computer (AAPL), a simple, rainbow-striped apple with a bite taken out of it. For Janoff, it was another day's work; but for Apple, the logo helped forge an iconic brand that today has an estimated worth of over $9 billion. "I got a nice trip for me and my family to Disneyland," says Janoff of his compensation, adding that "It would have been great if I could have gotten some stock [in Apple]."

Taking stock in a brand you help to create is the concept that helped inspire ad industry veteran Carl Johnson to leave a top post at TBWA Worldwide in 2002 to co-found Anomaly, a New York ad firm that opened its doors in 2004. Already, projects for clients like Coca-Cola (KO), Bluetooth headset maker Aliph, and airline startup Virgin America have earned Anomaly credibility on Madison Avenue and more calls from big advertisers. More traditional campaigns for clients like Coke have seen Anomaly acting as a jack-of-all-trades marketer: designing bottles and producing 30-second TV spots. But the agency's unconventional approach of treating marketing campaigns more like intellectual property to be licensed than commodities to be sold could disrupt the long-held model of a nearly $150 billion industry.

Casting Call

Johnson is one of six partners at Anomaly, many of whom were once senior directors at big agencies like TBWA, Weiden & Kennedy, and Saatchi & Saatchi. Each heads a different area of concentration for the 90-person company, such as business strategy or digital creative work. One partner is designated as the "creative catalyst," another is the "head of innovation"—the cutesy titles one might expect from an agency claiming to do things differently—but Johnson is adamant that free collaboration throughout the company is encouraged from inception through launch. And rather than passing assignments down a chain as is more typical in advertising, every new project is put before the entire team, who then "cast" the combination of partners best suited to take the reins.

"We surround what we see as the business issue, rather than 'the need to do an ad,'" says Johnson. Often this means acting more like a chameleon than an agency, tapping in-house pools of expertise in brand strategy, print, TV, digital, outdoor, and product design.

Sometimes, serving the "business issue" simply calls for a roving, creative mind with a keen eye for new trends. Partner Johnny Vulkan is head of innovation, a job that has recently seen him waiting in line four days for the Apple iPhone; having lunch with blog world royalty Arianna Huffington and Nick Denton; and taking a photographing trip to downtown Tokyo. His experiences might yield a promising new partnership, or just introduce the design team to a funky aesthetic they hadn't considered—he's the in-house trendspotter, if you will. Vulkan likes having a job with so little structure, although he admits, "there are moments where it's unclear which of the spinning plates I should stand under."

Personal Stake

Anomaly is currently putting all of its talent muscle to work on a project that takes flight Aug. 8, when passengers first hop aboard Virgin America, a low-fare airline formed by Richard Branson's Virgin Group and a group of U.S. investors, and based in Burlingame, Calif.