Mother will soon open its fourth office in the city of Los Angeles, California.
This news marks an expansion for the independent shop, which is currently the United Kingdom’s largest indie operation in terms of both staff and revenue. After launching “around a London kitchen table” London in 1996, the shop moved to New York in 2003 and Buenos Aires in 2005.
According to our sources, the process is well underway in L.A., and Mother has already begun hiring staff away from other area agencies.
“New York weather this time of year is brutal, and we’re tired of flying to see our lovely clients on the west coast,” wrote founding partner and creative chairman Paul Malmstrom, who helped launch the Manhattan office back in 2003 after working in the creative department at Fallon.
A spokesperson declined to elaborate on that statement or to provide more information on the clients mentioned. The agency website’s current client list does include a few companies based on the left coast including Netflix and Google; the agency also works with Headspace.
Mother went through a round of pre-holiday layoffs last month that affected multiple departments, and our sources claim that the newfound focus on L.A. stems, at least in part, from a “soft new business” environment in Manhattan. The agency also has a very active entrepreneurial division that includes such investments as pizza delivery apps and a San Diego-based “pre-covery” athleticwear brand called Snapbac.
In other recent Mother news, former Ogilvy New York CCO Corinna Falusi left her job to lead creative at the shop’s Manhattan office at the beginning of this month.