BotD: Another down year for ads; Meet the men of McDonald's new ad agency; Sandilands' brain drama
Welcome to an end of day edition of Unmade.
Today: The men of Maccas; Kyle Sandilands reveals he needs brain surgery; Guideline SMI says 2024 finished down.
If you’ve been thinking about upgrading to an Unmade membership, this is the perfect time. Your membership includes:
A complimentary ticket to all of Unmade’s events, including Compass Auckland (February 18), HumAIn (May 6), REmade (September 23), Unlock (October), and the Compass Australia series (throughout November);
Member-only content and our paywalled archives;
Your own copy of Media Unmade.
Media stocks catch a cold
Several of Australia’s media stocks started the week with a rough day on the ASX, with Nine losing 3.7%, ARN Media losing 3%, and Ooh Media losing 1.7%.
The Unmade Index lost 2.47%, its biggest one-day fall since the start of December. By contrast, the wider ASX All Ordinaries lost 1.8% today.
The day: Ad spend dips, the men who will sell McDonald’s and Sandilands gets ready for brain surgery
W+K brings in the McBlokes
Wieden + Kennedy unveiled the four creatives who will lead McDonald’s brand building efforts for the agency in Australia. It turns out that the four best-qualified people are all of similar gender and ethnic background

W+K told Little Black Book: "This crew immediately understood our fan to fan approach and the importance of having McDonald’s show up in culture, versus just making ads. Roy, Chris, Jack and Lochie all have an incredibly high level of craft, are great people, and we couldn’t be more excited to have them here.”
For cynics who think this might suggest a lack of diversity, it’s worth noting that only one of them has a moustache.
Creative Jet Swain, who kicked off last year’s furore over Campaign Brief’s male-centric coverage of creatives, posted on LinkedIn: “New Year, same tone-deaf landscape. Either women are not fans of, eat McDonald’s, buy for their families, and do not impact culture OR they were no good women creatives to service the account. Is this a misstep or a missed opportunity, Wieden + Kennedy?”
SMI wraps up 2024 on a downer
Guideline SMI shared its final calculations for agency ad spend in 2024.
December saw a 7.2% year-on-year decline, contributing to an overall 0.9% drop for the full year.
However, the five year trend suggests the decline in overall spend may be bottoming out.
Although marketers may be pausing their retreat, their mix is still shifting increasingly towards the digital platforms.
TV and newspapers were down by 9.5% and 12.5% respectively, across 2024. That decline accelerated in December, with revenues down by 11.3% and 13.4%. Cinemas, outdoor and digital were all up.
And SMI also lit the election Bat Signal. Government ad spend during December was up by 67.5% year on year.
Brain Scandilands
Just two weeks into the ten-year, $200m deal for The Kyle & Jackie O Show, Kyle Sandilands revealed the shock news that he has been diagnosed with a brain aneurysm. He told listeners that he will require six to eight weeks off from the Kiis FM show off to recover from the operation.
Asked on the show by executive producer Nat Penfold “Are you happy for us to leverage this for content on the show?” he replied “Yes of course”.
Time to leave you to your evening. We’ll be back with more soon.
Have a great day.
Toodlepip…
Tim Burrowes
Publisher - Unmade + Mumbrella
tim@unmade.media