Taxi NYC and Paul LaVoie

Paul LaVoie was inspired by famous ad man, Jay Chiat, who said: "How
big do we have to get before we get bad?"

Mr. LaVoie, founder and chief creative officer of hip new ad boutique
in New York called Taxi, believes the answer is 150.

"There is an African tribe which gets to 150 people then sends two of
its leaders out to start another tribe," he said in a recent
interview. "The US army never has more soldiers in a unit than 150 or
else it's dysfunctional and dysfunctional in military terms means
means dangerous."

He took his epiphany to the bank and two years ago left his Canadian
agency behind with its 150 employees in order to start another
"tribe".

"It was time to go and I said `where do Iwant to live? New York City
of course,'" he explained.

Almost immediately, Taxi New York and Mr. LaVoie made a splash. The
firm is moving into bigger premises and has turned down business. For
his part, Mr. LaVoie just became President of the prestigious New York
Art Directors, an 85-year-old club which has had members such as Walt
Disney and other notables.

"I love New York. It has great attitude and anything is possible with
yelling or grease. It's friendly," he said. "I'm from Quebec City and
started Taxi after being creative director of Cossette [in Montreal].
Then I moved to Toronto until two years ago. Personally, I needed to
go and Taxi Canada has really taken off since I left. Maybe I should
leave New York quickly too."

Taxi began in 1992 and the name was chosen because it was unique, but
also symbolic.

"When I was working at a large agency I saw all those silos. Solving a
big problem requires you to think holistically. Agencies are ghettoes.
You don't make big things in ghettoes. You need clear focus and
collaboration, good mojo with the client and only three or four people
involved. You can only get four people into a taxi and there's more
accountability in a small group," he said.

Taxi was also different because it was art and design driven.
"We started by merging design and advertising and got involved in
client packaging, retail space design," he said.

Success came immediately to Taxi in New York which is surprising
since, unlike other agencies, Taxi's New York office was not opened
strictly to serve an existing Canadian client but a start-up hoping to
tap into fresh business.

"Most advertising agencies go to new countries on behalf of their
clients. The problem with Canada is we don't have global brands, apart
from Four Seasons, BlackBerry or Cirque du Soleil," he said.

So far, the gamble paid off for him and his 10 Canadian partners. Mr.
Lavoie said the firm is up to $100 million in billings and was
profitable in its first year. The tiny start-up's first big American
gig was to rebrand College Sports TV which was then subsequently sold
for $360 million. This generated attention and more business for the
firm than Taxi is able to, or wants to, handle.

"Turner Broadcasting invited us to do a pitch," he said. "We were too
busy so I referred them to Toronto and they won it. We have three or
four full-time gigs and a lot of project work. Clients, which have
agencies, want to use other agencies like us. They are not cheating
but curious."

Its New York clients also include Amp'd Mobile and Rail Europe. In
July, Outdoor Life Network -- a hockey broadcaster owned by Comcast
and soon to be known as Versus -- picked Taxi to handle its major
rebranding campaign this fall.

Taxi is moving to larger premises to accommodate its growing staff,
who are all in the twenties.

Last month, Mr. LaVoie hired former Euro
RSCG President, John Berg, to "operationalize" the company as well as
to relieve Mr. LaVoie from his role as acting President.

Taxi is now moving beyond its niche mandate into media planning for
its clients only because the media is changing.

"In 1960, if you advertised on the three networks, you could reach 90%
of housewives," he said. "Today, you need 100 networks to do that. Now
the media is a dialogue. We're conversing. It's not talking at me
anymore and the conversation is going on in all kinds of places."
But the firm will remain focused.

"We have no departments. We don't do direct mail or media buying," he
said. "Big agencies create beasts. They become a pitch machine and
pitch anything that moves. We're small. We politely decline, not
arrogantly. We chose our clients as they choose us. Just like
marriage. There are lots of bad marriages creating bad sex. We don't
want to do that."