Tiger Soup — Bill Fritsch

About

A career built on curiosity.

I started my communications career at Walt Disney and spent the next four decades building, leading, and selling creative agencies. As CEO of Digital Kitchen, I led one of the most inventive independent creative agencies of its era. Along the way I've built agencies from scratch and sold a couple of them — so I know this business from every angle.

Today, through Tiger Soup, I work exclusively with leaders of advertising agencies, PR firms, design companies, and digital marketing agencies. These are businesses I understand from the inside — how they grow, how they get stuck, and what it actually takes to move forward. The conversations are honest, the thinking is rigorous, and the goals are always bigger than where we started.

I live on Whidbey Island in Washington State.

A few things I believe

Most organizations underestimate themselves
The right question is worth more than a hundred answers
Clarity is a competitive advantage
Good work comes from people who feel trusted
Imagination is a discipline, not a talent
The view from outside is always useful

Work Together

Three ways I can help.

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Business Mentoring

One-on-one work with business owners and entrepreneurs who want to think more clearly, set more ambitious goals, and actually achieve them. Honest, practical, and tailored to where you are right now.

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Executive Advising

A trusted outside perspective for leaders navigating change, growth, or complexity. I help executives get unstuck, see around corners, and build the confidence to make consequential decisions.

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Speaking & Workshops

Engaging presentations and facilitated sessions on creative thinking, brand building, leadership, and organizational possibility. Built for real conversations, not keynote theater.

The Name

Why Tiger Soup?

People ask about the name all the time. It comes from something I've seen repeatedly — a pattern that shows up in creative agencies of every size.

When organizations hit a hard problem — stalled growth, eroding margins, a market that's moved on — the instinct is to get busy. To do the things that feel productive. Peel the carrots. Add the spices. Optimize what already exists. The work is real, the effort is genuine, and none of it is wrong.

But it's also not enough. Because to make tiger soup, you first have to catch the tiger. And catching the tiger means looking squarely — honestly, even painfully — at the thing that's actually stopping the business from growing. Not the comfortable problem. The real one.

That's the work I do. Not the carrots. The tiger.

"You can peel the carrots and add the spices. But unless you focus on catching the tiger — the hard part — you cannot have tiger soup."

In creative agencies, the tigers often look like this

Partner Conflicts

Founding partners who've grown in different directions, with misaligned visions for the agency's future — and no framework for resolving it.

Weak Business Development

An agency that wins work through relationships and reputation but has never built a real, repeatable engine for growth.

Concentration Risk

One client representing 40%, 50%, or more of revenue. Everyone knows it's dangerous. No one wants to say it out loud.

Employee Issues

Key talent that's disengaged, underperforming, or quietly looking elsewhere — and a leadership team reluctant to have the hard conversations.

Poor Cash Flow

Profitable on paper, perpetually stressed about cash. Slow-paying clients, bloated scopes, and billing practices that haven't kept up with the work.

Illustration by Katsiaryna Dubovik

Helping creative agencies solve the problems they'd rather not name.