CumminsRoss to open in Melbourne on 11.1.11

Sean Cummins has teamed with Jason Ross, the former executive creative director of CHEMelbourne, to start a new agency called CumminsRoss, which opens its doors on the 11th of January 2011 in St Kilda, Melbourne. 

They have assembled a team of eight partners across media, creative, digital, direct and strategy tocreate a one stop shop. 

The other partners, who also have equity in thebusiness, are former Wunderman MD Chris Jeffares as managing director; formerMindshare associate Kirsty Muddle as head of media strategy; former nationalstudio manager of cummins&partners Steven Tortosa as creative servicesdirector; Faye Collay former senior digital producer of Sapient Nitro as headof digital; former independent accountant Monique Swallow as finance director;and Michelle Wensor as head of operations.

The bundling up of all the skills and disciplines in oneplace under one brand – with new disciplines to be added acrossbranded content, product development, event management and PR as the agency grows – runs counter to recent trends to create specialist divisionswithin an agency network. 

 “We have – literally – bought in to the simple ideal that all aspects of the advertising and communications function should be in the one place. No fiefdoms, no silos, no divisions. And clients will benefit from this,” Ross told CB 

There aren’t any clients at present and the partners are yet to take part in any pitches – the idea is to open the doors and build the client base from there. 

 “I had a few fireside chats with senior respected marketers about thisidea and the overwhelming response was “thank god… a real one stop shop,” saidCummins, who sold his former agency Cummins&Partners to Nitro, which wasthen sold to Sapient to become SapientNitro. Cummins has been on gardening leave for the past year, although he has helped developed a reality TV show called The AdBreak to be broadcast in Asia that he will co-host. 

Ross (left), who spent the past five years at CHE Melbourne, leaving in September, started his career at Mojo in Melbourne working with Cummins. He’s also a former creative director and partner of M&C Saatchi Singapore and Auckland. 

“We always knew we would do it because we got on so well, created brilliantly together and most importantly launched new campaigns together that have stood the test of time,” said Ross on teaming up with Cummins to start an agency. 

This includes campaigns like Tourism Victoria which has run for 18 years, and the iconic NZ beer campaign Tui “Yeah Right” which has run for 15 years. 

 “When we thought about what sort of agency we wanted to have, we knew it couldn’t be just a couple of creative guys sitting at acoffee shop,” added Cummins. 

“We started talking about what we have called the New Advertising. It’s not just about digital, social media or all the journalese in the industry currently. It’s about a new era in advertising that is more personal, more relevant, more global, operates in real time – that means faster and cheaper – and is powered by constantly evolving technology,” said Ross. 

Cummins (left) said that big agencies may face the Roman Empire or Mayan Dynasty complex becoming so used to their way of life and their structure, that when they try to change, downsize or adapt, the people panic and the empire collapses. 

“Of course people may say, it’s back to the future as a model. And in essence it is…that model worked. And advertising has been the poorer for the split up ofthese disciplines. And now, traditional agencies are scrambling to find ways tobring their various ‘brands’ back together. We can do it from day one,” he said. 

 There are plans to have offices in Asia starting with Singapore and Shanghai within 12 months. This will either come fromtheir own investment, or an alliance with a network that shares similarambitions.