Inside Job - How the New Gen of In-House Agencies Has Found Its Creative Ambition

In-house agencies have boomed in recent years, challenging preconceptions and coming out swinging with strong creative ambitions, seen in both the work they’re producing and the talent they’re recruiting.

At a panel on Monday June 17th at Cannes Lions on the LBB Beach, leaders from some of the world’s most impressive in-house agencies gathered together to discuss the unique challenges and opportunities of life working at a brand, where they’ve found their creative swagger and what the future looks like for this growing corner of the industry.

Featured on the panel was Simon Au, ECD at The Kitchen North America, Kraft Heinz; Jo Shoesmith, VP and global CCO at Amazon; Matthew Watson, ECD, at Sips & Bites, PepsiCo; Mariota Essery, ECD at Superette, DoorDash; and Carlo Cavallone, VP of creative at Lego. The session was moderated by Alex Reeves, EMEA editor of Little Black Book.

“What I really want to focus on is that the agency we are building is a creative-first agency where young people actually want to come to build their careers versus to retire,” said Simon, kicking off a discussion around how each of the agency’s would like to be perceived in the wider agency landscape. “I think there’s a misconception that people want to go in-house to get a corporate pay cheque and that’s it. That’s not what we’re building.” Simon estimates that more than 70% of The Kitchen’s new hires are gen z and he is really focused on developing work and a culture that develops their careers. “We want to look at in-house as an advantage, not a disadvantage in the creative process.”

“I don’t think jobs like ours existed 10 years ago,” added Jo, referencing how the in-house teams she encountered during her traditional agency life were more focused on design practices instead of above the line communications. “In this world where we need to make more and move faster, having people close to the problem that can help the agencies move faster and our team move faster to solve problems has been amazing, and has created more jobs and different types of jobs. For a graduate to come out of school and their first stop to be in-house feels like the new way.”

The panellists went on to discuss the benefits of being so close to the business elements of the brand they’re advertising, both with regard to the work and their own personal skillsets. 

Mariota, an art director by trade, said she never thought she would understand a business like DoorDash. “I am a creative first but I have become so much more business savvy, and I think it has helped our creativity. I think that’s the most important thing when I’m mentoring our creative teams. I say stay close to the business, understand the business and then you are able to make great creative that drives the business forward, and that’s the most important thing.”

“The thing [for me],” says Carlo, a relatively new hire at LEGO following his role as CCO at 72andSunny, “is timeliness, because once you're in an in-house agency, you know when things are happening. Another part of getting to good work and effective work is understanding when things happen. The LEGO Group makes physical products. So, there's a whole process, and you need to understand it. And you also need to know when marketing and creativity intervene. I think that full understanding of it is difficult to have outside, and that's an advantage for sure.”

The conversation moved onto the process of pitching - or lack thereof when it comes to many in-house agencies. Pitching has become a controversial practice in advertising in recent years due to the long hours and heavy expenditure committed to them, often to no avail. Matthew from Sips & Bites doesn’t ever pitch. “It's probably our mantra or like a rule of engagement,” he said. “It just doesn't make any business sense for our business to have two agencies, especially one in-house, one external and paying for both. We just let the work do the talking. And then if our brand teams in different regions see our work, and they want to do work like that, they come to us for that."

"Yes, there's a lovely adrenaline and togetherness that runs through an agency when you're pitching, but what that's allowed us and our teams to do is build a culture of balance. Our teams have the most amazing work-life balance, which allows them to spend time outside of work being inspired with their families seeing things and enjoying themselves, which bleeds into their work, their happiness and their enjoyment in themselves. You just see it and it's such a magical thing.”

Not everyone on the panel was in the same position as Matthew, however. For example, the team at Superette handles all of DoorDash’s agency relationships. When it comes to pitching, Mariota feels like she can help guide and bring a creative perspective to the pitching process that in turns supports the agencies that are involved. 

“You don't want to do to other people what has been done to you in the past,” added Carlo. “And you want to treat them as well as you've been treated in the past. So I think it's a very honest, open relationship, and probably the same with other people here - if you have experience and have been in agencies, you know what happens when there's a pitch or when you're presenting to clients, so you try to be helpful and constructive and also help people decode the situations. This is how an internal agency can be of help to an external agency - with information and not sending people into crazy spins.”

The conversation concluded with each of the five in-house agency representatives revealing one thing that they’ve been positively surprised by since joining their respective businesses. Simon from Heinz was quick to heap praise on the close bond that he has with the legal team at Kraft Heinz, and shared how that relationship recently resulted in a quick fire launch of a collaboration with KitKat. This all feeds into the agility of in-house agencies, which is a common topic of discussion when speaking about them.

“Two to three weeks ago, we saw this trend online about people eating their KitKats with ketchup,” said Simon. “No, I haven't tried it! But within two weeks, we had a conversation with KitKat, and we're launching a new flavour of Heinz Ketchup KitKat. That's the agility that we didn't have before, and now we do because we know who to talk to.”

Jo said, “I've really enjoyed - and at first, it was a bit uncomfortable - being across the table from the greatest agencies in the world when they pitch, and seeing everyone's style and how they construct their stories. I've learned so much just from watching that part of the process. Every creative would love to be a fly on the wall to other agencies' pitches, and we get to do that all the time. That's amazing!”

“When you're inside a business,” added Matthew, “the collaboration is real. I think for me, that was probably the biggest thing. I was like, 'This is how we do it? Great. I'm into this, let's go'. And I think the agility piece is absolutely key. To make sure you're constantly nimble with your ideas and constantly nimble with who you get them to and where you distribute them around the business to get approval.”

“[Having] access to things and sitting down with the people who actually designed the [Lego] sets, understanding the process and having a say on things that happen at that level, is beautiful,” said Carlo. “The possibility to be so close to things that you've always seen from a certain distance before.”

“Spending 20 years on the agency side,” concluded Mariota, “and always having that difference of a client-agency relationship was something that I had to get over very, very quickly. It's not about 'these are now my clients'. This is our team. This is our marketing team. And we're all in it together to make great creative work. That was something that was wonderful once I'd cracked that code, of being able to have my team instead of 'us versus them'.”

To find out more about programming during Cannes Lions on the LBB Beach, click here.