Agencies
State of Play
Revised Nov 1, 2026The moment. The holding companies reported, and the gap between them is the story. Campaign’s Elena Lewis has Omnicom’s organic revenue up 7.2% in Q3, from 6.1% in Q2 and 3.9% in Q1, with core revenue up 7% to $6.01 billion. Adweek’s Alison Weissbrot has WPP’s revenue less pass-through costs down 2.1% to $3.2 billion, narrower than Q2’s 2.8% decline, with WPP Media back to 0.3% growth for the first time in six quarters. Omnicom took Coca-Cola’s North America media account, which leaves Coke and PepsiCo having effectively swapped agencies in that market; WPP Media won Transport for London’s account, worth about fifty million pounds. The executive moves ran the same direction: McCann made Andrés Ordóñez global chairman, Publicis named Scott Hagedorn the first CEO of its Marcel AI platform, and Stagwell bought Freestar and put James Denton-Clark in charge of Europe.
The tension. The holdcos are moving onto the other side of the trade. Digiday’s Ronan Shields reads Stagwell’s Freestar deal as putting buying and selling under one roof, and Publicis now owns LiveRamp under an FTC firewall, so the firms that audit media are increasingly the firms that sell it. The way business is won has fragmented too: Digiday’s Seb Joseph finds no common pitch shape left across the earnings calls. Buyers are pushing Q4 money into social, video and retail media, and Digiday’s Sam Bradley has NBA linear and streaming inventory all but sold out across Peacock, Amazon and Disney for the 2026–27 season, which sends brands toward creators by default rather than by plan.
Who’s moving. Omnicom, at 7.2% organic. WPP, narrowing its decline to 2.1%. Coca-Cola, moving North America to Omnicom. WPP Media, on Transport for London. Stagwell, buying Freestar. James Denton-Clark, to Stagwell Europe. McCann’s Andrés Ordóñez, to global chairman. Publicis’s Scott Hagedorn, to Marcel. Skydance’s Jay Askinasi, on a unified ad organization. Media buyers, on an NBA season all but sold out. The American Entertainment Alliance, backing a 20% federal production incentive as a first step. Walmart, building its Q4 around a Muppets parody.
What the desk is watching. Whether Dentsu lands nearer Omnicom’s 7.2% or WPP’s 2.1%, and whether Stagwell’s clients ask which side of the Freestar trade they are on.
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Amazon’s local ad unit is teaming with iHeart, Spectrum Reach on SMB deals
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88% of advertisers now use AI in creative production, XR study finds
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BIA: local media ad spend still a $185 billion market despite platform shift
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WPP’s Rose posts better pitch numbers a year in, but margin gap persists
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The Hollywood Reporter’s Katie Kilkenny reports that Assemblymember Rick Chavez Zbur and Senator Ben Allen introduced AB/SB 186 to soften new business tax credit caps on Hollywood.
Why silence no longer saves brands from cancellation cycles
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Scripps hires NBCUniversal sales veteran Jen Carfley
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Old Navy overhauls marketing after summer sales slump, CEO exit
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