W. B. Doner & Co. Ad Firm Shuts Los Angeles Office
Yet another major out-of-town advertising agency, W. B. Doner & Co., has closed its Los Angeles office.
The agency, which has headquarters in both suburban Detroit and Baltimore, on Thursday abruptly closed its Los Angeles office nearly nine years after it opened.
This marks the third big out-of-town agency to close its Los Angeles division in less than a year. Last month, the new ad firm Scali, McCabe, Sloves announced plans to close its Los Angeles office. Last May, the New York-based advertising company William Esty Co. shut its Los Angeles operations.
Doner’s Los Angeles clients--including Epyx, the computer game company, Gotcha Sportswear and KABC radio--is being turned over to a new agency operated by Doner’s Los Angeles general manager, Nancy Shalek.
Doner has worldwide billings of $275 million, but reported billings in Los Angeles of just $20 million.
Executives from Doner’s Baltimore and Southfield, Mich., offices on Thursday refused to explain the reason for the sudden closing.
‘Thrilled’ With Independence
“The clients have been notified, and I would expect that they will continue with the Shalek Agency,” said Herbert D. Fried, Doner’s chairman of the board, in a prepared statement.
Although it closed the Los Angeles office, the firm said in its press release that Doner plans to open an overseas office in London to serve client British Petroleum.
In Los Angeles, Shalek is thrilled with the new independence. “We decided that everybody would be happier this way,” said Shalek. “I have a personal belief that the kind of business done in Los Angeles is very different--much more entrepreneurial--than the kind of business that is done back East.”
Shalek said most of the 27 employees will remain with the firm, although several media buyers will be laid off. Billings have dropped since late last year, when the firm lost the $6-million advertising account for the Giant grocery chain owned by Ralphs. Ralphs has since killed efforts to develop a separate identity for the Giant stores.
Lost Giant Account
Until late 1986, Shalek owned the ad agency Wexler & Shalek, which was purchased by Doner in late 1986.
Since the two firms merged, however, former employees say that creative conflicts with Doner’s headquarters offices have been many. Several senior executives and creative directors have left the firm over the past year.
But former employees say the issue came to a head late last year after Doner lost the Giant account. Doner’s Los Angeles office created the Giant’s off-the-wall ads that featured comedian Roseanne Barr. But after Ralphs decided to put the Giant account up for review, it was Doner’s Michigan office--and not the Los Angeles office--that made the ultimately unsuccessful presentation to keep the grocery chain’s business.
Senior executives at rival ad agencies say they are not surprised that Doner has left town, and some executives say that more big agencies may follow.
