After three months Lowe Sydney farewells ECD Mike Barnwell, promotes Mel Peters to the role
Campaign Brief can reveal that Lowe Sydney has parted ways with its executive creative director, Mike Barnwell (far left), less than three months after bringing him in from South Africa – and has elevated current digital creative head Mel Peters (left) to the role.
Peters has been at Lowe since October last year, recruited from Citrus, Melbourne, when she replaced Tom Markham, who is now the worldwide digital CD of Lowe, based in New York (as first reported by CB).
Before coming to Sydney, Barnwell was most recently ECD of Grey South Africa, based in Johannesburg.He filled the role temporarily held by head of art Simon Cox after the departure of former ECD Dave Johnson in mid 2009. Cox departed the agency earlier this year.
Expat South African CDs have not had a great run lately. The departure of Barnwell comes after The Campaign Palace Melbourne parted ways with its South Africanexpat creative directors Gerhard Myburgh and Brent Liebenberg in May, who left after less than 18 months in the role.
81 Comments
A while back, I thought South Africans would do pretty well in Australia. The work coming from that country is fresh, and their budgets aren’t great. So I figured they’d probably thrive in oz.
I think maybe I was wrong.
That’s just disgraceful.
Why bring someone all the way from South Africa for less than 3 months employment.
All that shows in inept recruitment by the agency.
That’s Lowe.
Well, well, well…just when you thought things couldn’t get any worse at Lowe they do.
Feel sorry for the South African dude, it wasn’t ever really going to work out, not with the current management.
And with digital in charge, c’mon, what about Big Ideas?
Seems a knee jerk reaction to the whole digital nonsense thing, a late one at that.
It’s a desperate act by management.
As the saying goes ‘A fish always rots from the head’.
Lowe Sydney has become an absolute joke. They are firmly run by a bunch of suits who are the real cause for their lack of creative success of late. They don’t need another ECD, they need new leadership.
@9.51
Funny.
They both look tough don’t they. Why do creatives always feel they need to look tough in their promo pics? The hard men and young ladeees of advertising, saving the world one ad at a time.
Tony, if you remove the words ‘by the’ from your last sentence, you’d be right.
Poor bastard. This is fucked.
It’s shit like this that the industry should hang its head in shame for.
8.44 hit the nail on the head.
What kind of Mickey Mouse Club is running that place at Lowe?
It’s someone’s career FFS! Get it right!
What’s obvious from this stuff up is that there’s management at Lowe who can’t even make a CD appointment last 3 months.
Sack whoever made the appointment.
TVOR…totally agree with what you’re saying.
What work has the digital department done when it comes to ‘the big idea’ working across multiple channels?
None.
Panic has set in at Lowe and they’ve fallen for the emperors new clothes, but they’re a bit late as the digital tidal wave has subsided, as all fads do.
Get someone in who knows how to run an agency and service it’s clients.
looks like an upgrade anyway
Agreed. Disgraceful. If you can’t hire a CD and let him do his job you shouldn’t be in this industry full stop.
Soon the only one left will be Monique.
Enjoyed working with you Mike. You’re the real deal.
Sorry Mike. That’s properly shit.
Didn’t think he would stay in an environment without a creative soul. Respect!
How Lowe can they go?
A great creative who’s met a bad agency.
Rise above it Mike.
10:21, in case you hadn’t noticed, digital creatives come up with big ideas too. In fact, most are capable of working right through the line, unlike many narrow-minded creatives who think big ideas are limited to a big budget TVC.
Where’s Lionel?
Where’s Mike going?
I feel really sorry for Mike; he’s a real talent and a great bloke. But when you have an account mgmt specialist recruitment firm working with an agency on their creative leadership / ECD role it was never really going to work. A real shame for Mike.
I can’t take this anymore.
I worked with both CDs. Mike is the type of creative who takes creative ideas and elevates them to greatness. It”s a real shame that a once strong agency is on its last legs. And a shame that MIke has been treated this way.
not so long ago fellow ipg agency and leader in its field, mccann, also promoted their digital cd to ecd of the creative agency. now how long did that last?
3 months is a ridiculously short space of time in which to prove yourself.
Particularly when you’re looking for a house, getting your life out of storage, arranging silly things like bank accounts, telephones and internet, and keeping your wife and kids from imploding due to being very far away from friends and family.
Sure, everyone knows that it’s tough moving overseas. But you don’t realise exactly how tough it is until you do it.
Mike is a great creative and a hell of a nice guy. He’s also a serious CD who took a shit South African agency and turned it into chocolate cake. He has done it before, and he can do it again. But it takes a bit more than 3 months.
So, bad for Mike. But also bad for the agency that spent all that money getting him over here, and then didn’t give him a chance to settle in. Let alone shine.
I just don’t get it.
Congrats Mel. Have fun.
9.40
LOL!
Agencies need to be honest when hiring cd’s about what really matters at the end of the day, especially with the ones from overseas who don’t know the lie of the land and may buy the spiel.
It’s going to be interesting to see how the guy from Goodby goes at Ogilvy.
Totally agree with the above. 3 months is no time to let someone settle in from overseas and try and even start to turn an agency around. Disgusting.
MIKE IS ONE OF THE BEST ECD’S IN THE BUSINESS.
LOWE IS FUCKING CRAZY TO DRIVE HIM AWAY LIKE THEY DID.
LOWE NEEDS TO CHANGE THE WAY THEY RUN THAT AGENCY OR NOBODY WILL WANT TO WORK THERE ANYMORE.
The reason for the three months is so they don’t have to pay the headhunter fee, perhaps?
Let’s look at track record here. Mike is highly awarded, worked in SA’s top agencies, turned his last agency around in 2 years to become top of the network, and is spoken about with nothing but respect from people who work with him, including here. Lowe was bloody lucky to have been able to entice him over.
That agency badly needs creative transformation, but can’t handle the pushback it requires to get great work out. Why buy a dog and then bark yourself?
Mike, Lowe’s loss is going to be someone else’s gain. Good on you for being true to your creative convictions, Mike.
Lowe Sydney Management, you never cease to amaze. I know 3 months is the norm over there these days before they kick you out the door (or you leave out of sheer frustration) but don’t you think that this is the sort of knee jerk reaction that has turned this agency from somewhere with real promise 2 years ago to a bit of an embarrassment. It’s really sad.
Thank god Mon is still there to polish those Snoop and FFA trophies. With the constant comings and goings that have plagued the creative department (and indeed the agency as a whole) over the last year, it looks like you might not be getting any more for a while…
I really hope you prove us wrong, Mel. Good luck!
What is going on with this, bring the top guys over from SA and then drop them just as quick? Agencies have to stop stuffing with people’s lives like this.
They just lost J&J Baby – which is the biggest part of the J&J business and probably the only true ATL account. probably down to the money.
The problem is, there’s a fundamental difference in the way that we work.
The SA approach is to lock yourself away, put your head down and smash your face repeatedly into the brief until it’s cracked (The brief. Not your face).
The Aussies seem to take a more collaborative, friendly, talk-it-out-until-you’ve-solved-it-and-move-on approach.
Both work. Both produce fantastic ads. But the two don’t work well together.
Doesn’t do Lowe nor Australia’s reputation any good.
Treat people as you would expect to be treated yourself. These people are selling houses and packing up lives and yanking kids out of school to work here. At least give them the benefit of more than a couple of months and a couple of freelance teams in their arsenal to prove themselves.
Just do us all a favour and close shop already.
Ah that’s fucked, even on a basic human level. We’re such a notoriously capricious industry and we always see this shit happening but it’s different when you think about the guy who moved his whole family – his whole life – here, only to be dumped within 3 months.
Feel for you Mike. Met you when you’d just come in and you were so keen to turn around that agency but obviously the rot is too far gone.
PPPPEEEEETTTTTEEEEERRRRSSSS!!!!!
Mike is a cool guy. Lowe have made and incredibly shyte move. Shame on you narrow minded, penny pinching accountants for stuffing up someone’s life like this – Pathetic. Anyone who would go work there after this a complete fool. If the digital gang is still in charge 3 months from now I’ll eat my URL.
On the upside it sounds like a shit hot CD is on the market and is dead keen for a job.
1.59. You said.
It’s fucked on the most basic human level.
HANG YOUR HEADS IN SHAME LOWE.
THEY DON’T COME ANY LOWER THAN YOU.
Fucking Mickey Mouse Club alright.
An agency that should be forced to put a ‘CONDEMNED’ sign on it’s door to warn those going through it.
Lowe, Lowe, Lowe your boat squarely up shit creek. Merrily, merrily…
bad luck Mike that place is a joke. you tried but the fact is one can’t unscramble eggs.
What has Mel done?
It’s been asked before but no-one ever answers.
It makes sense though because they really don’t like creative people at Lowe.
@ 1:20
Mate you’re an idiot. It’s a culture definer PER AGENCY, not per country. And I’d know, being an Aussie partnered with a Saffa, that there’s no such thing as the drivel you’re saying.
Geez! And I thought people hated Singos…
They should Ctrl + Alt + Del the management team
Lowe
Mike: Winner of the ‘Brief But Big Impact’ Award. Now we’re all going to add him of Facebook.
Take that, Lowe!
Hate the game, not the players, people. Yes, we all feel for Mike, and it’s a shame, but obviously they needed someone to step in and Mel was it. It’s not her making and it’s not her fault. She has stepped in to avoid a vacuum and she’s obviously qualified.
@ 3:27
reckon there’s some truth in what 1:20 said.
I’ve found working here pretty different to working in SA. Yeah, all comes down to individual agencies, but on the whole, different.
@3:57
you are a pc
This situation eptiomises the very, very worst aspect of the advertsing business.
That people can be treated so shabbily and with no respect at all. Hired and fired, all in a days work. Every possible rule in the HR book being chucked out the window and treated with absolute contempt.
But few have sunk as low as Lowe just have.
4.59, It’s all been downhill over the last few years. Dejan & coleman left. Now they’ve lost soccer aust, J&J and a few others. They can’t even do a good job of doing a bad job!
See all those Cannes Lions in Lowe reception? There was a time when this agency was worth something. The people who had the passion, did the work and inspired the agency have long gone. Hear that? It’s the sound of nothing.
Is it April the first??
Lynchy…why do you keep taking out any reference to Mel Peters when i write a comment.
All I’m saying is where’s the work?
So this is clearly the one article where no comments will be censored. Awesome. What else can we say about Lowe…
As for the previous management, if they hadn’t left Lowe would have shut its doors 2 years ago.
So where’s Matthew Bull (also a South African) in all of this? Matthew is CCO of Lowe and probably had a HUGE say in who got the Lowe gig in Sydney. Maybe Matthew should fire some mgt suits. To think that in 10 years a great 300 strong agency (Lintas, which became APL, then Lowe Lintas, then Lowe Hunt) has been run into the ground by successive managements is shameful. Losing J&J will be the death nail of Lowe here.
Observe.
A deeply appropriate savaging being administered.
Well deserved.
I feel for Mike as I feel for every other staff member that has left that place due to unfortunate leadership. But for every company that falls another will rise creating new opportunities…. That’s advertising. That’s life.
Forgive them for they know not what they do.
All i’m seeing here is a bunch of lowe / ex lowe children venting because they are too chicken shit to talk to management and actually FIX stuff..
@ 12.41 Maybe that’s why they’re ex Lowe children.
12.41.
No I’m not from Lowe. Not even close.
And while people like you sit with your head up your arse, people like this dude will continue to be treated like pieces of shit on some arsehole’s shoe.
NOT…GOOD…ENOUGH.
It’s that simple. Nothing else.
@12:41
No, I think the majority of people hating on here are just human, and it’s a natural human reaction to lash out when we see insufferable injustice meted out to someone undeserving.
Vasbyt boetie. Someone here will open a door soon.
Fuck Lynchy – don’t go changing my post. This is a blog. If you don’t fucking like what I say, then don’t publish it. It’s MY OPINION. It’s not for you to change. If I deem that xxxxx was in part responsible for Lowe’s downfall, then it’s my opinion. This censorship is probably a result of your friendship with xxxxx. You can’t run an open forum whilst protecting your mates.
Three months is a pretty standard trial period. If things aren’t working, no point in continuing for appearances sake.
I hope he is well compensated for being dicked around like this though. It makes Lowe look like tossers and not him.
What a huge mistake Lowe is making losing Mike, hopefully to the opposition, who will come back to haunt them!!
@1.26 ‘arse’ ‘shit’ ‘arsehole’ reads ‘angry kid’, and i’m sure poor mikey got a fair exit deal, they wouldn’t have just chucked him..
@1.31 lashing out is bad.. get some anger management, learn to communicate your feelings sensibly and find a resolve rather than lashing out..
Insufferable injustice!! drama queen!!
MMMmkaaay…
If you get sacked after 3 months, the assassin/s usually decide (for whatever reason) that they are going to fire you shortly after you start and spend the rest of the time trying to figure out how and when to do it.
I was fired quite a few times – I can boast nine in all – usually not because my work was sub-standard, but because my personality or my outspokenness rubbed people up the wrong way. ( I could go on at length about that – and funnily enough I’m 115,000 words into a bitter, twisted memoir – but that’s another story.)
Since no-one on this blog who knows Mike (and I don’t) has a bad word to say about him on either a personal or professional level, this sacking certainly is very, very curious.
(Actually, I just recalled that on one occasion I was fired at a minute to midnight after nine month’s service – just before a severence payout equivalent to three months salary kicked in, so there may have been some similar clause which dictated the timing in this case.)
Did he have a run-in with a client? Did he challenge the authority of his employer? Did his accent grate? Sometimes it’s the most ridiculous thing. Certainly, the possibilities are tantalizing.
If Mike returns to South Africa, he would not be compromsing his future work prospects in this country to reveal all in a penetrating Campaign Brief article.
I’d like to see that.
It really upsets me, all you people having a go at such a great upstanding agency.
Congrats mel, you’ll do well 🙂
Have they done anything since that MTV Snoop Dog campaign?
What has the new ECD done?
Why won’t anyone answer that?
How did she get the job of ECD?
I’ve seen three others ask on this thread alone.
Just wanna know what it takes.
They could have elevated Monique to ECD. She’s got a good grasp of big ideas.
NO F%&$#@*&Kin way! LOWE are you FR#@*&^%)* serious. How Can you lure someone from their own country (and from a full time job), relocate (Probably at his cost) and fire him (OH sorry Farewell him) C%&TS.
AD world (And I can go global on this) Lets boycott LOWE Sydney Office. They sound like a bunch of #@*% BANANAS
WTF. GFYFC LOWE. Pity