Editorial: Ad agencies do not exist to promote themselves.(Saatchi and Saatchi, advertising agency)(Editorial)

Stop a random selection of people in the street and ask them to name an ad agency and there's little doubt about the answer you'll get.

While a smattering of those taking part in such a straw poll might drag J. Walter Thompson from the back of their minds, it's odds-on that one name will be a clear winner: Saatchi & Saatchi.

And no wonder. The Charlotte Street agency is the only one that has succeeded in building a reputation beyond the confines of the ad village. Its role in bringing Margaret Thatcher's Conservative Party into government in 1979 also brought the power of advertising into the public consciousness as never before. In the process, the Saatchi brothers became household names.

Nevertheless, the agency's decision to run a consumer campaign this month to reinforce its public status, using a combination of radio and newspapers, must be seen to have practical value and not as an exercise in self-indulgence.

It's not hard to see the relevance of the famous 1970 ad penned by the Saatchis creative Jeremy Sinclair and headed: 'Why I think it's time for a new kind of advertising.' Nor to understand the thinking behind a further ad by the ...