Global advertising agency Ogilvy, cited as a key inspiration for the TV series “Mad Men,” offered a potential management-level employee a salary of $35,000 per year — in New York City.
Critics took to LinkedIn to scoff at the barely-above-minimum wage offer for a business manager position that requires three-plus years of project management, finance or operations experience and includes managing $5 million to $10 million of business.
“Ogilvy should be ashamed,” Corey Mercer, founder of creative agency Frnds Agency, shared on the work-oriented social media site. She ended her indignant rant with a message to Ogilvy, part of the WPP Group global agency network, to “do better,” followed by, “P.S. This is probably why you’ve gotten 8 applicants in over a week…”
Not long after the angry comments poured in, the company bumped up the low end of the range to $45,000.
At $35,000 a year, a New Yorker would take home roughly $2,310 a month. That total ticks up to $2,900 for a $45,000 salary.
Neither sum would cover the rent for a New York City apartment, where the average unit goes for $3,776 a month, according to Apartments.com.
New York’s current minimum wage is $16 per hour, and a $35,000-a-year job doesn’t pay even $1 over that for a 40-hour week. A $45,000 salary equates to $21.63 an hour.
“What is this, a salary for ants? In all seriousness, this is WTAF levels of nonsense,” said Kat Merrill-Horne, a global payroll manager who recently took a job as a senior manager of human resources. “New York City, Manager title, 3+ years experience and 35k? Ogilvy’s 2023 revenue was $5.9B (and no I didn’t mistype, that B is legit). Even making the argument for ‘cost of doing business’ this is a straight up disrespectful wage offering.”
Adam Nelsen, a software design consultant, added a quote from the company’s late founder, David Ogilvy, in his book “Confessions of an Advertising Man:” “Pay peanuts and you get monkeys.”
Ogilvy didn’t respond to requests for comment.
