Amar Chohan- Department of Creative Affairs

Amar Chohan is the founder of Department of Creative Affairs (DCA), a venture built to map and champion the independent creative agency sector. A near-accidental entrant to the industry, he trained as a lawyer before walking away from it, then spent almost 12 years at Contagious across two stints, rising to global commercial director. In this conversation, he reflects on that formative period, the thinking behind DCA, and why he believes the independent sector is the real future of creativity.Six themes from the conversation.1. An accidental path into the industryAmmar didn't plan a career in advertising. He trained as a lawyer before making what he calls "the brave decision" to walk away, a move his parents struggled to understand. What pulled him toward Contagious wasn't the sector but the stage of company: "I just wanted to go in somewhere where I could make my mark… be the master of my own destiny."2. Contagious as the defining chapterHe describes his 12 years at Contagious as "the defining stage of my career" before launching DCA. The experience gave him a rare vantage point, working with both agencies and brands. "There's no better place to understand the importance and the power of creativity in our industry," he says, crediting it with "a knack for seeing what's happening in our industry and what that evolution means."3. The holding company distortionThis is the conviction underpinning DCA. Ammar's frustration is that trade press, awards, and search consultants remain anchored to holding companies that represent a sliver of the global market: "The holding company agencies represent 1%, a fraction of the entire agency market around the world. So why is that anchoring the mood and the coverage?" The downstream effect, he argues, is an ambient pessimism that paints the whole sector as struggling, when in reality the independent world contains "everything you could possibly need, whether it's a two-person studio or a 200-person global media planning and buying shop."4. Editorial DNA carried forwardDCA inherits something essential from Contagious. Ammar calls the original print magazine "the most expensive business card on the planet," not profitable alone but the product that opened every door. What made Contagious trusted was editorial authority and curation, and that's the posture DCA takes toward a noisier market: "We've got to be the signal in a world of just overwhelming amounts of information."5. Curation as the core productHe's firm that DCA isn't an open directory. "99% of creative businesses are independent, not all can and should be on the map. So our job is to discover and curate, and invest." A quality threshold matters because DCA's claim that clients should prioritise independents only holds up if every match produces great work. It also solves a real marketer pain point: "They know what they need is out there, but they don't know where to find it."6. Visibility as the agencies' real problemAmmar is blunt about why most independent agencies plateau. Word of mouth takes them only so far. "If a client doesn't know you exist, how do you possibly make your way into the consideration set?" He has no patience for agencies that neglect their own marketing: "The whole cobbler's sons' shoes thing is inexcusable today. We can't keep on using that as an excuse."https://www.thedca.co/