TBWA\Chiat\Day moves from Madison Avenue, signals end of 'Mad Men' era

In an ad published in The New York Times, the agency announced its departure from the celebrated NY street.

American advertising agency TBWA\Chiat\Day has announced its departure from its long inhabited office in Madison Avenue, New York. The agency announced this via an evocative ad in The New York Times, calling itself the “last big ad agency”.

For decades, the term Madison Avenue has been a metonymically used phrase to capture the essence of the American advertising industry, owing to the exponential growth of the sector in the area. The place was home to the explosive rise in advertising industry in the 1950s and 60s, often referred to as the Mad Men era.

The full-page ad is a succinct piece of reminiscent tribute to Avenue Madison that has, according to the agency, had an indelible contribution to its growth. The agency bid farewell to its old offices, thanking the street “for being our crazy industry’s stomping ground for all these years.”

The ad also celebrated the avenue for being home to some of the most iconic ideas concocted by famous agencies over the years, including ‘Think small’, ‘Mikey likes it’, ‘Where’s the beef?’, ‘The choice of a new generation’, and ‘I want my MTV!’.

The ad ends with TBWA\Chiat\Day calling the move an end of ‘old advertising’ and the dawn of a ‘whole new thing’. The agency will now operate from the east of 42nd Street.