Gross said it became “challenging” to hire staff for a period of time during the pandemic as the demand for work increased.
“Especially with smaller agencies, there's never a resource equilibrium,” said Gross. “So you either need people or you need work. And that is a big impact on your business because when you have unallocated resources, they're not generating income.”
For participating agencies, Shipyard presents “a revenue stream on the utilization side.” He said that for shops only occupied 75% of the time, this could give them the ability to generate revenue during the other 25%, keeping employees busy with interesting new projects.
“As more and more assignments become project-based, agencies have had to become more agile, flexible and adaptive,” said Greg Paull, principal, and co-founder of consultancy R3. “Already, freelance costs are the second largest expense for most holding groups, after salaries and their role is only going to be more and more important.”
Employment in advertising, public relations and related services fell by 1,000 jobs in February, the fourth drop in the past six months.