Ad agency founder leaves as firm returns to its roots

Big advertising agencies, Edward Estipona says, do just fine. So do little boutique firms.

But those in the middle a group in which his Reno-based firm found itself in the past couple of years get squeezed from both sides.

Estipona is moving back to his firm's small-agency roots as the firm rethinks its strategy.

The big news to come out of the rethinking: Mike Vialpando, a co-founder of the 13-year-old agency previously known as Estipona Vialpando Partners left on July 31.

The departure, which the firm describes as amicable, came as Vialpando decided to focus on his photo-simulation and art-direction businesses.

The agency now will be known as Estipona Group. Along with Estipona, its team includes Paige Galeoto as creative director, Dali Wiederhoft as public relations director, Brian Raska as senior art director and Omar Pierce as art director.

The company's clients include Trammell Crow Co., Reno Chamber Orchestra and At Home with Harrah among others.

"We needed to go back to our roots," Estipona said last week.

The company in recent years had handled ever-larger accounts big pieces of its billings at one time or another came from Washoe Medical Center and the Reno-Sparks Convention & Visitors Bureau and its staff had grown to 10 people.

But middle-sized agencies such that which the firm was becoming are vulnerable to competition from well-heeled big agencies or hungry little boutiques.

Caught in the squeeze, the agency in 2005 dipped into unprofitability before righting the ship this year.

"You either have to grow and grow fast, or focus on what you do well," Estipona said.

Estipona's team decided to focus on what they do well working with companies, many of them entrepreneurial or start-ups, hungry to become market leaders.

The company also believes it can capitalize on its strength in health-related advertising and public relations.

But Estipona said the company also remains picky about its clients, meeting with them for two or three hours at the start to figure out if the client and the agency are a good fit.

"You've got to push the clients out of their comfort zones sometimes," Estipona said.

In exchange, he said, the agency's staffers will work to keep out of their own comfort zones by development of a variety of advertising strategies.

"We tend not to get fixated on just one thing," he said.

An example: While many agencies these days focus heavily on branding, Estipona believes clients increasingly want to see faster results from their advertising and have less patience with brand-building.

"We're going to bring what the client needs," he said.

Estipona described the reorganization the agency took to get itself back into the black as painful. But he said the focus of the agency's management always remained on its strategic goals rather than the bottom line.

"If you're strategically on," he said, "the money will come."