Get marketing news you'll actually want to read
Marketing Brew informs marketing pros of the latest on brand strategy, social media, and ad tech via our weekday newsletter, virtual events, marketing conferences, and digital guides.
This holiday season may not be looking so jolly for some people in adland, unfortunately. IPG laid off staffers across its UM and Magna arms, according to Digiday, marking the latest in multiple rounds that happened over the year both at IPG and in the larger industry.
The recent layoffs affected senior leadership, among others: EVPs Brian Hughes and Scott Suky, at Magna and UM respectively, were dismissed, Digiday reported, as were UM EVPs Kristin Jones and Andrea Ebert. The latest changes add to a year of considerable executive turnover at IPG, whose data boss, Arun Kumar, as well as UM privacy head Arielle Garcia and UM global chief media officer Joshua Lowcock, all vacated their roles in recent months. UM also lost its CEO, Sasha Savic, in June, less than five months after he assumed the role.
IPG did not return Marketing Brew’s request for comment by publication.
Financially, 2023 has been a mixed bag for IPG. The group notched several business wins, gaining the accounts of Geico, General Mills, and Bristol Myers Squibb, among others. However, in September, Amazon put its account with IPG Mediabrands in review, and BMW broke up with IPG in October, handing its US, Canada, and Latin America business to Omnicom.
IPG will also lose Spotify, which put its account under review in November.
Happening all over again: After IPG’s Deutsch New York lost its PNC Bank account to Arnold Worldwide in June, Deutsch canned nearly 20% of its workforce. And IPG’s R/GA cut roughly 15% of its staff this spring.
Across the industry, layoffs have been commonplace this year. Stagwell cut 300 staffers in the first quarter, and one of its agencies, Anomaly, shed almost 10% of its employees in January, citing a loss of business from Dunkin’ Donuts as a catalyst. In March, Accenture, which owns Accenture Song and Droga5, said it would cut 19,000 jobs over the next 18 months. RPA also cut staff in May.