Just Asking: Are Holiday Parties Different This Year?

We asked agency, client and media executives if they were planning holiday parties this year — and if so, how those parties would differ from years’ past.

“We were planning an agency-wide trip to Vegas: stay at the Wynn, gorge out on Lobster Dan Dan at Wing Lei and swim Scrooge McDuck style through mounds of cocaine. Instead, we’re just taking a bus to Mohegan Sun.” -Charles Rosen, partner, Amalgamated

“We’ll eat. We’ll drink. We’ll laugh. And someone will shamefully slink into the office the next day. Late. So in all the ways that matter, it won’t differ from holiday parties in years past.” -Kathi Skow, president, Anderson/Skow

“A holiday party is still viable. We’re sending the invitations this week-and then we’re selling the list data.” -Greg DiNoto, CEO, DiNoto

“Yes we are! It will differ in that we won’t be footing the bill for the entire advertising industry to get incredibly sloshed. We’ll only be footing the bill for them getting halfway there. They’re going to have to finish the job themselves.” -Rick Webb, co-founder and COO, The Barbarian Group

“Doing the annual dinner with employees and significant others. Same place, but a few more people this year than last. We’re knocking on wood daily.” -Jeff Freedman, founder and principal, Small Army

“We’re having a party, yes. But we’re going to party like it’s 1929.” -Jamie Barrett, cd, Goodby, Silverstein & Partners

We don’t believe the economy is in as bad a shape as it was in 1933. We believe that the precedent for the next few years was actually set in 1067, the year after the Norman Invasion when the victorious legions of William the Conqueror and their marauding celebrations set off a cycle of peasant discontent not seen since the 930s.  Crops burned, financiers were burned as witches, and Druids were rounded up and deported to the Black Forest. We’ll be celebrating this with an open bar at Medieval Times. -Michael Lebowitz, CEO, Big Spaceship