It was a big week for indie recognition — Ad Age’s 2026 Leading Women list showed up in what felt like half the feed, and the U.S. Agency Awards handed out some hardware too. But the through-line running underneath everything was AI: not the breathless kind, but the working-it-out kind. Members are launching AI divisions, arguing about whether machines can write with any flavor, and untangling what the EU now counts as a deep fake. Meanwhile the creative kept coming — a giant condiment feud in Times Square, a protein bodega in Brooklyn, and a claw machine at WNBA All-Star Weekend. Here’s what Indie Agency News members were up to.
🏆 The Women Leading the List
Ad Age’s 2026 Leading Women list gave the indie community plenty to celebrate. Highdive saw Chief Marketing and Growth Officer Isabel Long named to the list, while Murder Hornet took a table at the lunch to toast Alexandra McInnis, also honored. Hunterblu Media cheered on Jessica Blumberg’s recognition, and Special U.S. celebrated client partner École Weinstein of Uber, who made the list with the memorable line that “doing boring work is a waste of everyone’s time.” McKinney added to the tally with Ufonabasi Brown named an Ad Age Rising Star, and Klick picked up a nod for Stephanie D’Agostino as a 2026 Ragan’s Top Women in Marketing honoree in the Tech/Digital category.
🥇 Trophies and Ballots
Beyond the Leading Women, the awards kept stacking up. Stella Rising won twice at the 2026 U.S. Agency Awards, taking Digital Agency of the Year and Media Buying Agency of the Year, with judges citing their clear positioning and how they’re adapting to AI while keeping the expertise clients count on. Day One Agency picked up a 2026 Webby Award in Social: Sports for its work with Converse. X&O struck gold at the Small Agency of the Year Awards, and The Perception earned a Mid-Atlantic Emmy nomination for its Indivisible campaign with Visit Philadelphia. Preston Spire landed its Project Lockdown gun-safety work — six kids, one lemonade stand, $10 gun locks sold — in Communication Arts Advertising Annual 67.
🤖 AI, Minus the Hype
The most interesting AI takes this week were the skeptical ones. 270B‘s Creative Director Lynn Bossange argued that AI writing is “the steamed, unsalted carrots of content” — technically edible, totally forgettable — and that the friction of writing is exactly what gives it voice. Awestruck went the other direction and turned itself into the lab, embedding an AI transformation across every department before launching Awestruck AI, a division that builds and deploys working agents inside client businesses.
Chameleon Collective spotlighted a sharp piece from SPS Commerce’s Michael Svatek arguing that AI can’t improve manufacturing until suppliers fix their data first — with 80% of manufacturers planning to spend a fifth of their improvement budgets on smart manufacturing, yet returns falling short. On the legal side, Davis+Gilbert LLP unpacked how the EU AI Act’s guidance defines a “deep fake” far more broadly than face swaps — covering AI-generated products, places, and events — while Legal+Creative | Toerek Law noted that agencies are increasingly fielding a simple client question: “Did you use AI for this?”
🌭 Campaigns Worth Clicking
The creative had range this week. Rethink hijacked a viral mustard-covered hot dog sculpture in Times Square by showing up with Heinz ketchup, because it has to be Heinz. Quality Meats Creative landed the Ad Age number one campaign of the week for Herb Light. TiNY apologized to the inventor of the extendable dog-scratcher after its Minties “Dog Breath Is Over” spot got picked up by Ads of the World. Witness Me shared RadicalMedia director Dave Meyers’ four-part Depop campaign starring Zara Larsson, and Loop.co teamed with Paramount Pictures on a Heart of the Beast poster generator that casts your dog as the star of the show.
🥽 Experiences You Can Step Into
Experiential and immersive work kept expanding its footprint. The Many flagged that Apple TV will debut Apple Immersive on its Friday Night Baseball broadcast August 28 for Vision Pro users — another sign of where its Catalyst XR work is headed. Project Worldwide agencies Praytell and Motive opened “The Prodega,” a protein bodega in Brooklyn, to relaunch Muscle Milk. Praytell separately turned the DICK’S Sporting Goods ScoreCard+ launch into a game, sending Knicks player Tyler Kolek undercover as a store teammate to surprise loyal fans. Innocean USA built a Kia claw-machine AMA with WNBA legend Chiney Ogwumike during All-Star Weekend, and Barbarian led the digital experience design for Samsung’s Galaxy Unpacked 2026 lineup.
🎤 The SXSW Vote-Getters
PanelPicker season is on, and members are campaigning. Happylucky is making its loudest case yet for “Memory Metrics over Vanity Metrics,” arguing our measurement systems haven’t caught up to experiential. Gus paired Co-Founder Graham Douglas with PepsiCo’s Nick Cline for “How Category Leaders Can Still Be Category Disruptors,” moderated by Axios’ Kerry Flynn. Saylor wants to spill Tubi’s fully reactive social playbook — the streamer that “started with the comments” instead of a calendar. Lupine Creative is backing Kate Wolff’s panel on friction versus immediate gratification, and Highdive put up a session on its Jackass-meets-KFC federal-holiday collab.
📊 The Numbers Behind the Work
A few members brought receipts. Klick‘s latest Wire reported that 93% of physicians are receptive to ads, multichannel engagement can drive up to a 9.3x lift in Rx, and an AI early-warning system was associated with 19% fewer deaths among high-risk ER patients. GTE Canada‘s Jenny Croswell pushed back on the Gen Z-doesn’t-watch-TV myth, noting their viewing has spread across linear, CTV, and streaming rather than disappeared. Fuse Create‘s Rita Steinberg weighed in on what’s driving retail media’s growth in Canada, and Fohr‘s James Nord argued in Martech Record that creator marketing still isn’t a functioning market. Model B shared Bluevine SVP Casey Akerblom’s playbook for a platform with 1M+ customers, $2B in deposits, and $17B in loans delivered.
🎂 Milestones and Small-Hours Wins
Some anniversaries are worth pausing on. Laughlin Constable is celebrating 50 years of independence, sharing the actual memo that wished its founders well when they made a bet on themselves in 1976. SkyCare Air Ambulance & Charters marked 20 years since its first medevac mission, and Erich & Kallman revisited a decade of work with a look back at its Go-Gurt campaigns from the General Mills years. Quirk Creative congratulated client Quince on crossing $2 billion in sales, crediting the performance TV creative it built around timeless quality at low prices.
☕ The Human Stuff
And then there’s the everyday agency life that makes the feed feel real. VaynerMedia ran a string of relatable ones this week, from taking “flexible work from home” very literally to the eternal truth that if you save files normally and not “v5_Final_FINAL,” no you don’t. Curiosity turned its own brand palette into a guessing game (“which is Curiosity pink?”), and Clever Creative dropped a hot take worth sitting with: your brand doesn’t have a marketing problem, it has a decision-making problem. Buntin put it plainly too — the industry is desperate for a fresh voice, and it’s time to focus on solving clients’ hardest problems.
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