20 people used to be a capability advantage. In 2026, they're increasingly an overhead. The headcount tax is what happens when agencies pass that overhead to you - and the data you hand them leaks into public AI APIs. There's a better way.
AI is devaluing routine agency work and inflating the value of judgment, taste, and strategy. Working with a non-bloated agency is the cost hack the market hasn't caught up with yet.
The bloated agency is a dead model: overhead is a tax, bigger teams get less per person, and trust decides who gets bought. Here's what replaces the machine in the AI era - a small senior tribe that does the work.
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