Speculation Arises Over Closure of Long-Time Ad Firm

Ventura County advertising and public relations executives have differing views regarding the closure earlier this month of the county’s largest advertising and public relations firm, the Murphy Organization.

After 25 years in business, Murphy has shut its doors, and most of its staff and clients have moved to an Agoura Hills agency, Mustang Marketing & Advertising.

Murphy’s former vice president and creative director, Madeline Murphy, blames Ventura County’s lingering recession for closure of the firm that she headed with her husband, Robert, who was president.

Although Madeline Murphy and four others were hired by Mustang, Robert Murphy was not. She declined to say whether she and her husband have become part-owners of Mustang.

“As the recession deepened, more and more of our clients reduced or even eliminated their marketing budgets,” Madeline Murphy said. “Some of them turned to out-of-work advertising and PR people who could afford to charge lower fees because they didn’t have our expenses.”

This, she said, cut into Murphy’s revenues and led to its demise.

Some industry leaders, however, think that there may be other reasons behind the closure.

“They had a respectable client base. I’m surprised they couldn’t make it under those circumstances,” said Keith Johnston, president of Johnston Ad Groups, a Ventura agency. “It’s possible that they were having management problems.”

Added Stan Whisenhunt, head of Ventura-based Stan Whisenhunt Public Relations: “This may be more of a lifestyle change for the Murphys than anything else.”

The economy is still tough, he conceded, “but business has been getting better. The Murphys may simply have gotten tired of all the overhead and headaches involved in running a large agency.”

But Madeline Murphy insists that declining revenues were the only problem that forced the agency’s closure. She would not disclose the Murphy Organization’s billings or other financial information.

Bob Arlow, past president of the county’s Public Information Communicators Assn. and head of the Arlow Group, a Thousand Oaks ad and PR firm, noted that Madeline Murphy has good reason to despair over a lackluster local economy.

“Business in this county is struggling, just as it is in Los Angeles and elsewhere,” he said. “Instead of going to a large agency such as Murphy was, clients these days want to know whether you can save them money by using desktop publishing.”

At its peak in 1991, the Murphy Organization had 24 employees. Along with revenues, the payroll shrank as some of the agency’s largest clients, such as Bank of A. Levy, began to retrench.

In a final effort to contain costs, Murphy moved from Oxnard’s Union Bank Tower to smaller quarters in Camarillo. In the end, only eight employees remained, including the Murphys.

Mustang President Scott Harris says his firm has acquired several major Murphy accounts, including Cal Lutheran University, 3M Co.’s Camarillo plant, Martin V. Smith & Associates and Ahmanson Land Co., developer of the controversial Ahmanson Ranch project in eastern Ventura County.

Even before the closure, Mustang had acquired former Murphy client Bank of A. Levy--an account that’s scheduled to disappear when Levy is acquired by First Interstate Bank.

Mustang already had several clients in Ventura County, including Technicolor Video Services, Power-One Inc. and California Amplifier. The agency also represents the L. A. Dodgers and Pepperdine University.

Harris said the ex-Murphy staffers will strengthen Mustang by providing PR and media-buying expertise. He said his firm already prides itself on its strength in graphics.

“The new people will help us offer our clients full-service marketing power,” he said.