ABSTRACT
To build on discussions in Chapter 4 and continue the task of analysing the geography of the work of global advertising agencies, this chapter draws on data collected through interviews with advertising executives to unpack the spatiality of the different management, strategic and creative tasks associated with the development of advertising campaigns. This unpacking reveals the multiple and inter-twined geographies of the three different types of advertising work, and shows how cities pin down each type of work in different ways depending on their territorial assets and network connectivity. In particular, it is shown that cities can capture advertising work by manufacturing themselves a role in client relationship management, strategic planning or creative work. Those cities that play a role in all three stages of work, management, planning and creativity, and that attract and generate global flows of such work, become the most successful advertising centres. The analysis, therefore, provides a way of further exploring the different roles and network connectivities of cities identified in Chapter 4 and sets the strategic context for subsequent chapters on New York, Los Angeles and Detroit and the role of these different US cities in the work of global advertising agencies.
