DISQUS

getreal · 8 months ago

Kalter is a real humanitarian...... along with Hitler
the ones leaving Doner are the lucky ones!

Gator Lee · 8 months ago

Sorry to hear it. Good agency.

adfan · 8 months ago

you must mean, used to be a good agency. Kalter is turning over power to an arrogant, no talent guy, Demuth. The new CCO and Media Director haven't helped bring in any new business. It's a sinking ship.

Robert Sawyer · 8 months ago

I doubt clients and prospective clients can expect much "innovative thinking, distinctive creative, and flawless execution" from an agency that demonstrates so little imagination in dealing with the current economic stress. Alan Kalter may be a jolly good fellow but his letter was as pointless as it was insincere. If I were looking for an agency today I don't think Doner would be on my short list.

UnlikeBrod · 8 months ago

Gee, you'd think they would just get it over with rather than send out an e-mail as they let people go in dribs and drabs. PNC, Expedia out the door and a lawsuit and stock buyout with the ex-CCO means lean times in Detroit no doubt.

Average Everyday Guy · 8 months ago

sorry, but I gotta correct you Adfan.

Arrogant? David? Have you ever met the guy?

And you also say the new CCO hasn't brought in any business? Wrong again. There have been a handful of wins in the last year. Against great competitors, too.

Account losses are due to the economy, not any lack of leadership on the creative side, I promise you.

Please do some homework before you slander people you don't even know.

I'm Rather Average Myself · 8 months ago

Preface: I worked at Doner for several years and still keep in touch with people there.

I can share your disdain for personal attacks on blogs by people who leave anonymous comments. That being said, I’m not sure you can necessarily assume that adfan doesn’t know David or is being slanderous. I never worked with him but can attest that adfan isn’t alone in having an unfavorable opinion of him. Whether it’s right or wrong is, of course, another matter but adfan has their opinion as you have yours and both can be valid based on each of your particular dealings with him.

As for the account losses being due to the economy, that’s not entirely accurate. While I’m certain that the recession is affecting Doner as it is everyone else, it is also true that they have steadily lost a lot of business for the past few years (BFG, Progressive, hotels.com, Canadian Tire to name a few) and this has simply continued on through the economic downturn. PNC left because they felt they outgrew Doner now that they’ve acquired National City. Expedia put their account up for review - and didn’t invite Doner to defend. Word is that Doner found out about this by reading it in the press along with everyone else. Neither of these examples has anything to do with the economy.

Average Everyday Guy · 8 months ago

Points taken. We'll agree it's subjective. I'm not negating Adfan's opinion. But he certainly didn't every qualify it as "one guy's opinion".

But on the second point.... those accounts that you've just named to support your argument were ALL lost previous to current creative leadership. With the exception of PNC. So, I'm not sure you've made a strong point there.

Regardless, I'm not interested in continuing this in some long exchange so I'll just say that as a former employee there myself who also keeps in touch, I wish both you AND the agency well.

I'm Rather Average Myself · 8 months ago

Please don't misunderstand, I was making no comment on the current creative leadership. I left before he came in so I wouldn't be able to comment. My point was that Doner was having problems long before the economy went south. In fact, I'd have to believe the new CCO was brought in as a specific response to those problems.

Detroit Metro Ad Man · 8 months ago

Why is this news? Just like Campbell-Ewald, it seems like Doner is always laying people off. At least once a year, it seems I hear of layoffs over there. It's just how they do business: hire and fire. It's their corporate culture. Part of their business plan, I reckon.

jane · 8 months ago

Regardless of comments, I like it when stuff is posted about the Detroit ad community. I'm an ex-Michigander ad person and even if everyone sounds pissed off; well, it's comforting in some way. And regardless of snarky remarks...very real and genuine. Look, I'm sending the state and everyone there...even the poops, good vibes. Things will turn around eventually. And just so everyone knows, things aren't any better in the other 49 states. So there. Cheers!

JohnDoener · 8 months ago

Doner will never achieve it's former glory. That was an empire built ok big retail accounts that spent gobs of money on broadcast. Kalter spent the first half of his career building the monster - which earned jim and many others a lot of money. Unfortunately, Kalter made a lot of money and somehow got it in his mind that he deserved respect as a marketing thought leader. Arrogance, born out of success built on a base form of advertising, led to good people and good clients heading for the door. Now, the big retailers are gone, smart marketers don't think the agency is particularly smart and they were very late to the digital game. Their reputation is that they are arrogant and not very creative, that may have changed, but they will be spending a long time getting smaller as they try to prove it. The good old days are gone and only DeCerchio was smart enough to realize it!

Detroit Digital Guru · 8 months ago

They're definitely not known as a digital shop.

BigErn · 8 months ago

As a former insider, Doner has several problems. They are primarily a broadcast creative agency. Their small media planning and buying team will never compete with holding companies and they lack the strategic planning and interactive prowess to compete with the larger agencies.

True they had a big string of wins for a while, but the big clients left after they realized that the low-ball fees really do mean you get what you pay for.

Once there · 8 months ago

I was in Doner media long ago as well as with the larger holding companies. The holding company argument for clout doesn't always hold true as it's hard to outperform the market when you are the market. The disappearance of retail chains, bodes poorly for small and independent agencies. Dominant retailers can keep consumer prices low while the quest for efficiency in the economy squeezes more and more jobs out of it.

Ex-Donerite · 8 months ago

Doner's problems didn't start with the bad economy. They started with an aversion to change. They were so into their traditions that they failed to react to a changing world or even recognize that their ways of doing things were no longer working.

A few points:

Management's philosophy of under-staffing accounts nearly always caught up with them. Clients soon realized that too few people were working on their business, and the ones that were were often pretty junior.

What's more, Doner's formulaic approach to creative worked for a while. But how many times can you re-sell the same old hackneyed retail creative? I sat in many concepting sessions where the creatives complained that even a good idea wouldn't be recognized as such -- because it didn't fit the Doner creative formula.

Also, by burying their head in the sand when it comes to the internet, they were left hopelessly in the dust. They refused to build a website for YEARS, and when they finally did, it resembled something that a high-school student might build. Their internet aversion was strange a few years ago. Today it is outright ridiculous. Every marketing campaign needs an interactive component. Why would you trust your business to an agency that barely has a website?

I do have to disagree with the comments on Kalter, though. I have seen him in presentations and in meetings. I disagree with those who say he isn't visionary or strategic. He had a way of cutting through the bullshit like nobody else. Was he power hungry? Of course. Did he deliver bad news with a smile on his face? Yes. But that doesn't take away from his other talents.

As for Demuth...he's not that arrogant. He has been on a quest to take over the agency for at least 10 years. So it's not surprising if he has. But I found him to be fairly nice, and more important, very very smart.

If only he could shake Doner out of its intransigence, the agency might still have a chance.

BigErn · 8 months ago

Kalter may be strategic and visionary, but the shop is crumbling around him. If this were a public company and not his own personal Cuba, he would have been fired years ago. Too bad he lost Yolles. That guy brought in a ton of new business. Right now, the Newport Beach office is the only bright spot and if Mazda bolts that's toast. How long can ZOOM-ZOOM really last?

If things keep going this way, DeMuth will take over and find himself in an office the size of the one he came from in Cleveland.

I Used To Work At Doner · 8 months ago

Ex-Donerite,

Good post and I agree with your points but it’s interesting in that what you say in general about Doner contradicts what you say specifically about Kalter. You say that he is strategic and visionary at the same time as listing agency characteristics which belie your point.

For example, you say that the creative was formulaic and I can agree. But if Kalter is as strategic as you suggest, why would he ever allow it to become so staid?

And if he were so visionary wouldn’t he have recognized the power of the internet or social media a long time ago - or at least have agreed to have a website created for the agency?

Also, to me, terms like strategic and visionary imply long-term thinking, and chronic understaffing is anything but. They were so focused on getting new business that they didn’t take enough time to think about how best to keep it. I think everyone who’s commented here can agree that the staffing situation was a factor in losing most, if not all, of that business for the past few years.

I’m not posting this as a specific criticism of Kalter, rather it’s just that I always found it interesting that almost everyone I knew there didn’t like working at Doner and voiced the same opinions as in the comments here but at the same time held Kalter in such reverence.

another exer · 8 months ago

I too worked there for many years and fortunately left. My take is this... like others here the agency culture is not always forthright.
Kalter: ascended to his to his position through plotting and conniving when Mr Doner passed, Staffing: a cultural norm to promise attention and understaff, Management: rule by fear, reap the rewards, abuse the workers ... If Mazda goes they are toast!

oracle · 8 months ago

who cares...... they are inconsequential and going nowhere

JohnDoener · 8 months ago

Oracle has a point, they don't even get graded by Adweek anymore. This is a place that used to get into every major pitch, now they are barely a blip on the agency radar screen. Yolles getting it was Kalter's way of dealing with the real problem: his own massive ego and inability to adapt to the world around him.

MOtowndawg · 8 months ago

I was a former Donerite and can attest to the fact that the current regime is still living in the past of former glories and nothing will change until Alan Kalter is put out to pasture. A person of true leadership and vision wouldn't never have allowed a once powerhouse to come to this point. This is the agency that asked us just how many licks does it take to get to the center of a Tootsie-roll Tootsie Pop. Remember the Vlasic stork? How about Scrubbing Bubbles? All of these are still on our airwaves today, but thats where it stops for Doner. For gods sake Mr. Kalter, do what's right and step down, and Demuth is not your answer to take over. Doner got it right by bringing in Rob Strasburg. That should be the thinking they bring for their next CEO. Someone out of state for sure, no current employee. Detroits not the problem for poor creative, its the folks on top who just don't know when its time to leave. I loved the people at Doner when i was there in the early 90s. The atmosphere was nothing but fun and nobody cared about working late. I'd rather see them go under than what I'm seeing now. Its disgraceful to Brods legacy.

Doner Ex · 8 months ago

More cuts today, but the big wigs still remain

NotAtDoner · 8 months ago

Kalter may know something about broadcast advertising, but he doesn't know anything about how to properly run an advertising agency. He needs to go.

BigErn · 8 months ago

Anyone wnat to share what's going on with the John DeChricio [Sic] lawsuit? Heard that he had to sue Doner for his stock buy out.

beenthere · 8 months ago

I've worked with many people in my career but never any worse than that malignant sociopath Kalter....... I can't comprehend how anyone stays there: either employees or clients.

Mrs Kalter · 8 months ago

heard Alan Kalter is sick.. hope its serious

Wizeass · 8 months ago

What a nice thing to say

ex-doner · 8 months ago

I would argue that Kalter is not visionary, but rather a master of "Smoke and Mirrors".

iknowalan · 8 months ago

more like master dickhead

Someone Who Knows · 8 months ago

They should have know severe cuts were coming when Alan Kalter announced the arrival of a new PR spin doctor to manage what is said about the agency to the press. The signs are always there, you just have to know how to read them.

The amazing thing is that Kalter also sent out a memo stating all the great things the agency was doing, only to turn around and fire most of the people responsible for the work. The man suffer from a sever case of Narcissistic Personality Disorder, meaning he's a certifiable little prick.

billyon · 8 months ago

Updated - http://www.mediabistro.com/agencyspy/doner/upda...