It has been a tough year in advertising. Budgets are leaner than a catwalk mode and project work is the new black helping to put agencies in the red. Network agencies have more lifeline resources. For little agencies it’s do or die and when it gets too tough dying happens.
Barton F. Graf 900 is closing its doors in December after a decade as an independent New York agency and now JohnXHannes has also announced its demise. Partners, Aussie expat, John McKelvey, and Hannes Ciatti, have said that this closure due to the pair now having different visions and ambitions.
McKelvey and Ciatti will be forming two new agencies. McKelvey will head up Mirimar, led by and Ciatti will lead and Alto.
JohnXHannes was launched in January 2016, by McKelvey and Ciatti, who had previously worked together at Droga5, R/GA and Whybin/TBWA. In July, it was named Ad Age’s Small Agency of the Year.
Among its high-profile campaigns are the film, Corazon, for Montefiore Hospital, which won the Health Grand Prix at Cannes Lions in 2018. The agency disguised a donation drive as a feature-length film that debuted during the Tribeca Film Festival.
For the Super Bowl that year, the agency created 2 Chainz – Expensify Thi$, “The World’s First Music Video You Can Expense, Feat. Dj Mustard and Adam Scott”. It was also the “most elaborate product demo in history, disguised as a music video”.
The year before, it created Make Your next Move with John Malkovich for Squarespace for the Super Bowl, in which the star tried to recall his own domain name from a digital squatter.
https://youtu.be/LgQB9cIa0DE
McKelvey has named his agency Mirimar (sea-view) because it was the name of the street in Australia in which he grew up. He has taken some of JohnXHannes’ people and some of its clients with him. Miramar has offices in Los Angeles and New York and describes itself as an agency that “creates cultural impact for brands. We develop and produce highly impactful creative communications at the intersection of advertising, entertainment, and technology. We offer strategic objectivity and transformational creative for brands biggest marketing moments.”
On its website the agency states that:
“We optimistically believe:
In creativity and collaboration.
Amongst an explosion of disposable content, a well-crafted, consistent brand story is only becoming more precious.
In the power of a small group of people coming together with big hearts.
That people only see what you make.
LESS TALKING. MORE MAKING.
