A Copywriter’s Lament

After 40 years in the ad industry as a copywriter and creative director, I have just witnessed something I never dreamed would occur. The B2B ad agency I worked for over two decades just released all of its writers, and will work with them only as freelancers if and when the need arises. Management says it’s because the writers were too expensive and there wasn’t enough work in this COVID19 world. Truth is, they have gone from having a roster of Fortune 500 clients doing huge branding initiatives to a project-based, locally-based website and social media workshop. In a world that pays lip service to “disruptive innovation”, they don’t want big thinking that challenges the status quo. By letting all their writers go, they are writing their own epitaph. One that fittingly uses a simple three-letter acronym: R.I.P.