Mojo agency brand disappears from Sydney as Publicis puts faith in Marcel offering
From Publicis Mojo to Marcel: staff and client roster moves to Marcel
Mojo Sydney – the celebrated agency brand that used Paul Hogan to bring the world to Australia – has been retired by holding group Publicis after nearly 40 years
The agency’s remaining clients will be folded into Publicis’ global agency Marcel, which officially launches its Australian outpost today under the lead of Droga5 Sydney founder David Nobay. The Mojo brand will continue to be used in Brisbane and Melbourne.
Mojo was once one of the world’s best known independent agencies after being formed by Alan Morris (Mo), who died in 2007, and Allan Johnston (Jo) in 1979.
I see Nobby’s eye has already been caught by some side project.
Publicis lost their Mojo. Literally.
A sad day.
the last decade of mismanagement has done so much damage to a once great agency brand, that the current managers think it’s better to abandon it altogether for a new agency name that means absolutely nothing
such a shame on so many levels
(would also be interested on a fact check on the claim of 50 Sydney staff)
Let’s be honest, they didn’t rebrand Brisbane or Melbourne, because if Sydney fails they’ll roll those remaining Mojo offices into Leo Burnett or Saatchi & Saatchi. Publicis didn’t want to bet the house on a questionable hand.
This will be as successful as that time Grey got itself a new ECD and rebranded itself JayGrey.
Fact Checker here ;
LinkedIn reports only 21 people for Publicis Sydney.
Pusher Sydney reports 8.
Maybe they’re counting shared services in ZO – finance, back office etc.
What a joke.
PR a new agency, while fold another.
No wonder clients think we can’t help their businesses when ours are such a mess of subterfuge and confusion.
Destroy one brand and replace it with one with no meaning in Aus.
This has to take the mumbrella ‘dumb award’ for the year.
That is hilarious
And what a sad day for Mojo – as a company – and probably more importantly as two ad people (mo + jo) it’s the end of an era.
Really sad – a true agency icon has fallen!
Deckchairs! Deckchairs!
I wonder how many of those people in the picture are actually Australian. How could they possibly have represented this countries most iconic agency. Mojo had an exhalted history of tapping into the Aussie consumer psyche with real insights because they were from here. This agency won’t.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sLisEEwYZvw
But no thanks.
That’s what happens when you don’t have any real creative leadership or firepower – are you listening Mr D??
FACEDESK :/
First it was WPP dumping the Campaign Palace. Now Publicis dumping Mojo. It simply shows how little they truly understand about building brands.and how out of touch with Australia they really are.
Really sad day.
When great people like Lois Donaldson left a year or so ago after over 20 years loyal service at Mojo you knew the culture of the place was on the nose.
When will the big holding companies finally realize people don’t work for nameless entities, but for people. I fear this is another own goal for Publicis in Australia.
Nothing Mojo did would have stood up by today’s standards. Let it go people.
@Thanks it is along time since Mojo had any real creative leadership or firepower. Some wanna be characters but not real depth or ability. Indeed some of the CDs were more like suits.
@PeteRush I agree. The standard of advertising today is fucking woeful!!
I beg to differ Pete. I would say most Australians over 30 would be able to sing a piece of work which came out of Mojo. If that’s not holding up standards I don’t know what is. No other agency now or before could claim that, except maybe the Palace.
Hey Pete, how old are you? Not old enough or too old to remember some great work from Mojo obviously
The CDs in recent years probably had to make silk purses out of sows ears. Besides Groucho, history indicates you probably Wouldn’t identify real creative firepower if it poked you in the eye with a cigar.
@@Groucho some of the best work comes from sow’s ears..Sadly it needs intelligence and experience to recognise that, not to mention knowing which end of a cigar to light, and which orifice to put it in. Of course the good ones will be in good positions now won’t they?
@Groucho, you are right, as shown by commentators here harking back to the pre Davis Cup years and no-one mentioning the awful work under the recent so-called creative doyens (eg that Qantas crap)
@@groucho – Mo and Jo made their name from making silk purses out of sows ears and grew from there – plus I’m not at all sure how you concluded “history indicates” – isn’t that just more just you being nasty?
@@Groucho
can u get an original handle please – it only requires a little bit of creative firepower
(no, not Zeppo or Chico)
*cough*
@Groucho Yes, you’re right.
Any creatives no longer there are in a good position.
“With digital in the foundations of its capabilities the new Marcel is built with the next 10 years in mind.”
Curious choice of ‘creative firepower’ for your Australian digital outpost.
Very curious.
Marcel = Lipstick on a pig! But on the up side, the failures from Droga have come to the rescue… this should be interesting!
Maybe they mean digital in the bowels of the organisation?
@Friends
Looks like some are more than friends!
Hope that smile gives somebody their MoJo back.
We are to blame. I wish as an industry we stood up and said, it’s our fault the work (everywhere) is crap. Digital is a wrought, ideas only solve problems is you have smart people, not hipsters or creatives trading off 1998.
http://pusher.com.au/
a digital agency with an un provisioned website?
smh
Hey smh,
un provisioned website? It went down because of too much traffic. A lot of people from around the world took a good look.
Mojo’s legacy (for me), is the memory of a lot of great TV adverts and their associated songs and music!