The agency’s four founders are Little Hands of Stone co-founders Michael Boychuk and Matt McCain, DNA founder and Chair Alan Brown and DNA co-owner and CEO Chris Witherspoon. They began talks in May, after knowing each other for years and competing in new business pitches over recent years.
The merger comes as there continues to be an influx of new agencies while existing ones are combining to stay competitive in a changing agency landscape.
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“It’s gotten much more competitive out there, especially from a business development standpoint,” Witherspoon said. “In this environment that is much more project-based, you can run into small creative boutiques and big holding company agencies … we had to make sure that we had the creative work that’s equally as strong as those creative boutiques, but also had the ability to scale to some extent as those bigger companies.”
Both agencies had creative chops. DNA also brings media and communications planning capabilities that Little Hands of Stone previously didn’t have.
“We realized, as we’ve won a few things, that our ability to scale and serve these kind of bigger pieces of business that we’re getting, were just not there and it would’ve taken us way too long to get to where we’d be happy with that ability without working with Chris and Alan,” Boychuk said.
“Our differences make us stronger, and we’re going to work hard to keep those differences intact, even as we merge together,” McCain added.