Are we going far enough?

Every week now, someone in advertising launches something new. A new agency. A new studio. A new AI-native creative collective, production workflow, etc. A lot of bets to reinvent themselves and survive the slow collapse of agencies. I get it, I am working on something new too.

And don’t get me wrong, I like the energy and wish everyone all the best. It takes courage and ambition to put something out there, we need more of that.

But when I look closely at all the new endeavours, it seems like most of it is the same thing in new packaging. Same services, faster and cheaper, with some AI sprinkled on top of it.

And I can’t help but wonder:
Is this it? Who is supposed to buy this?

The big companies may like a cheaper version of what they already have, for sure. But small savings are not making that much of a difference when the whole marketing landscape is shifting and the economy is fighting hard to avoid collapse.

What would make a difference now would be a new way to solve the problem that makes them hire agencies in the first place.

For example: What if brands didn’t need to make ads at all to connect with customers — through a trusted channel that makes it easy to buy their products directly?

An insane opportunity for every creative person: Stop trying to build an agency to make ads cheaper. And become a full-blown creator with an own channel instead.

Use your taste, your eye, your AI stack. Make the creative work you actually want to make. The stories, the visuals, whatever. Build an audience for it. And then partner with brands who want to be close to what you already have — not what they can brief you into.

A win win for both sides. No middleman, pitch theatre, watered-down ideas anymore. Just a person doing what they do best and a brand that gets what they need.

Of course, the creator game is another tricky challenge and you may be choosing between the devil and the deep blue sea. The brand’s marketing department would really need to shift their ways of working, let go of control, and find ways to fend off the legal team. But the shift would be radical and create a new kind of value an agency does not offer, wouldn’t it?

Again, I’m not rooting against any of the new launches. I’m rooting for them.

I just think — if we stop at “faster, cheaper, with AI,” it gets hard very quickly.
The bigger moves are sitting right there.

Someone has to take them.

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First published on LinkedIn, 09.04.2026.