Colenso BBDO on rebuilding a creative team and getting back to winning ways

Taking out two of the top accolades, eight Golds and a raft of Silvers and Bronze at the prestigious 2023 Axis awards, Colenso BBDO once again emerged as a leading creative force in the industry. We spoke with the agency’s Chief Creative Officer Simon Vicars about what these awards really mean, what it took to create this award-winning work, and how last year was a lesson on the virtue of patience.

With an unwavering commitment to pushing the boundaries of creativity and storytelling, Colenso BBDO’s haul of awards at the 43^rd Axis Awards secured its position as a powerhouse in the advertising world.

Alongside winning the Agency of the Year award and their client Spark NZ taking home Client of the Year, Colenso BBDO’s Skinny “Phone it in” campaign won six Gold awards in the categories of Radio & Audio, Out of Home, Direct Marketing, and Craft, while its work with Spark on “Beyond Binary Code” won a Gold in the Design and Digital & Interactive categories.

The Emerging Talent award also went to two up-and-coming marketers from Colenso BBDO, Callum McDonald and Charlotte Upton.

The Agency of the Year award was validation of the hard work the agency did in the last year while also trying to build their creative team, Vicars says, after not being able to bring in offshore talent during the pandemic years.

“When you’re building your team and trying to do the best work possible, that’s a pretty hard year. To win that award, whilst not having a full contingent of creatives and still getting that result was what made it a special for us.

“I always knew that the traits that you needed in this industry were energy and optimism, but I never knew patience was one of them. And we just had to have patience last year. Our clients were brilliantly patient as we built the team and the team here was patient as we built the work.”

Taking out two Golds, Colenso BBDO’s work with Spark on “Beyond Binary Code” may have demanded patience but it also delivered impactful results.

The goal of this work is to prompt businesses to reassess their approach to gathering gender data by first questioning the necessity of capturing such information. In the event that it is deemed necessary, an HTML code is provided to enhance the inclusivity of forms and fields on their website. This code is complemented by supplementary resources that guide businesses in adopting best practices in data privacy, securing company support, and catalysing transformative change within their organisation.

“I wanted to make it really quickly, but the right way to make it was slowly,” Vicars says. “So we made it slowly, we made it properly, we co-created with the trans and non-binary community, Outline (a Rainbow mental health organisation) and Spark, and we made it a real piece of utility that businesses could adopt and still adopt now.

“Patience is a trait I’ve had to learn, it doesn’t come naturally. So for that to really be acknowledged in New Zealand, with a couple of Golds, was a really proud moment.”

Skinny’s “Phone it In” campaign was also highly awarded. Vicars puts its success down to having a committed media client and Colenso partnership that “all got together and ran and created mischief and just had a heap of fun”. 

“What’s brilliant about Skinny is they really understand why they exist in the world as a brand. They are there to keep prices low and customers happy. That’s such a wonderfully simply defined space to think in.”

They knew they had struck gold, so to speak, with this concept when they presented it to the client and asked them to imagine if their competitor did the same campaign.

“Envy is funny in this industry. If I imagine another agency doing an idea and ask “How does that make me feel?”. If that burns me up with envy, then it’s probably a really good idea and we should make it. Whether that’s envy or creative insecurity, I’m not sure. But it is a really good test as to whether there’s something is creatively audacious and ambitious enough.”

While Vicars believes the industry has been creatively conservative over the past few years, the work that received recognition at the 2023 Axis Awards indicated to him that things were heading back to the benchmark that the New Zealand industry had before.

“The spread of really good work from Motion Sickness to Special to DDB to us, felt to me as if we were starting to get back to what the world knows us for, which is creative audacity.”

As for the future, Vicars says he is optimistic and believes the “creative ambition” New Zealand is known for is coming back.

“I just hope that that tailwind continues and we keep to keep pushing ourselves client side and agency side, just to keep making work that troubles the world’s best agencies as opposed to local agencies.”

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