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Weighing Location;
Despite Advantages of a Virtual Workplace, Proximity Still Important in Agency Selection
By Jennifer Gilbert, Advertising Age
Interactive Media & Marketing
December 6, 1999
An Excerpt
 Ask industry insiders about big interactive players and many of the same shops come up: Agency.com, Giant Step, Lot 21, Organic, Razorfish, and Red Sky Interactive. The well-known agencies with varying strengths and weaknesses all are based in major markets such as Chicago, New York, and San Francisco, where they have access to a large pool of talent and clients.
But off-the-beaten-path towns such as Chester, N.J.; Calgary, Alberta; and Columbia, S.C.; are home to many interactive shops. Even cities such as Houston and Bethesda, Md. — not exactly small towns — are out of the mainstream of interactive media.
... But older, more settled people are just what some interactive agencies want.
"We look for people who want a different quality of life," said Debra Taeschler, president of Chester, N.J.-based GráficaInter.active, a 65-person agency that has pitched against Agency.com, Razorfish, and others.
"If you are young and looking for work, you go to [New York]," she said. "But our employees are having children. The glamor's done. They are ready to settle down."
Finding these folks "is like finding a needle in a haystack," Ms. Taeschler said.
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