End of era as Cliff Freeman closes shop
November 3 2009, 8:04 am | | 4 Comments
AdAge reports that after 22 years, Cliff Freeman (left) the agency chief behind the landmark Little Caesars’ “Pizza Pizza” and Outpost.com campaigns – amongst many others – is shutting down his legendary New York agency, Cliff Freeman & Partners. According to AgencySpy, 2009 wasn’t too kind to CF&P, which reacquired MDC’s 20% stake earlier this year but lost clients like Snapple and Bonefish Grill as well as CEO Clayton Ruebensaall III after just five months. In a statement to AdAge, Cliff Freeman’s most notable current client, Baskin-Robbins, said it is “aware that Cliff Freeman & Partners has closed its doors. We have a search under way for a new agency partner.”
4 Comments
That’s a bummer. CF was an agency that we all wanted to work at back-in-the-day. Many of the people currently doing great things were schooled there.
RIP pizza pizza and flying gerbils.
Shows how brilliant W&K truly is.
Man what a shame. I loved the work that was coming out of there before 911. That was the thing that killed it. They had a point of view on humour that was built on the thought that ‘isn’t it funny when people get hurt. This was a place that had writers almost getting into a punch up over whether one syllable was funnier or two.
Under Eric Silver as Creative Director they produced many genius campaigns; Fox Regional Sports, Budget Rental cars, Outpost.
Truly some of the best advertising ever. What a shame.
Classic NY Jewish humour was the backbone of this agency. Damn shame they’re no longer – always loved their stuff. A lot of agencies try to do funny, but these guys actually nailed it by consistently making ads that actually made you laugh. Not just think “hmmmm… that’s amusing”, but laugh.