Hello Los Angeles. We're so happy to be opening there today and Crowd DNA founder/CEO Andy Crysell explains why...
It’s a proud and exciting day at Crowd DNA today, as we lift the curtain on our seventh office. This time our adventures take us to Los Angeles and we’re delighted to welcome on board David Stewart as our head of agency.
Why Los Angeles? Well, first up, why anywhere? We could do much of the global work that we do just from London, our original base. But we know we create a more compelling and human business by being about more than that. By placing ourselves closer to people and to the source of culture. We are more interesting for our clients and we bring together a more interesting team, too; one with broader perspectives, reference points and stories to tell.
London, Amsterdam, New York City, Singapore, Sydney, Stockholm – we’re proud of our leadership and of our teams in each of these locations. The mind-blowingly good work they create, the purposeful collaboration between them, and just how passionately they all dive into the inherent messiness of our culturally charged commercial advantage ethos. They have made Crowd DNA so very much more energized and thrilling than anything I could’ve cooked up just from London alone.
Yeah, but why Los Angeles? It’s a fascinating place – its origin story through to the distinct sub-cultures it’s created. My first visit was in 1997. I was there, as a journalist, to interview Wu-Tang Clan (who’d decamped to the city in the hope of getting their album finished) and, within three hours of me landing, what became known as the Real Heat (as in the movie) Bank Robbery kicked off, with the sky full of smoke and helicopters, and wall to wall coverage across every TV channel.
I’ve been back multiple times since – sometimes for a day or two, sometimes working there for four or five weeks. No other bank robberies of note, but it really is a place that gets under your skin. Some people from the UK and Europe get kind of sniffy about Los Angeles, thinking it soulless or center-less. I think it’s a place of limitless possibilities. Fabulous communities and people making new things happen, often from scratch. Los Angeles has its own kind of creativity.
We expect the briefs that Crowd DNA Los Angeles receives to be as varied – and amazing – as across our other offices. But we are particularly excited about the opportunities we will have here to dive deeper into the future of entertainment, a space that’s always been strong in our work. Web3, fandom, platform disruption, game-changing new content and ever more immersive experiences. So much of this is of interest to our clients (both in media/tech, and across other categories) and we’re keen to get closer to it all in Los Angeles.
Why David Stewart? We’ve had some fantastic conversations with David over the last couple of months and we can tell that he cares about the right stuff, the important stuff – both in the work and in our culture. His brilliant experience at agencies such as Kelton, Coherency and Jigsaw International helps too. We think he’ll be a wonderful addition to our senior team and we can’t wait to get to know him better.
And if you’d like to get to know him better, you could always check the Los Angeles openings on our careers page. We’re looking forward to now building out our team there.
Or if you’d just like to learn more about what we’ll be doing in Los Angeles, perhaps how we could collaborate in some form or fashion, do reach out to me or to David. (a.crysell@crowdDNA.com / d.stewart@crowdDNA.com).
Crowd DNA Los Angeles – a nice way to start the week.