The Australian ad agency Cummins & Partners has selected Canada for its second international office.
On April 8, the agency will officially open its newest office in Toronto, which follows the launch of its New York office last summer.
Though the office has only been in the works for a number of weeks, the newly mounted Cummins & Partners Canada already has a stable of clients that includes Heidi Klum Intimates, Perrier-Jouët and VDKA6100. The agency is also working with a yet-to-be-announced financial brand that will serve as an anchor client for the new office.
The agency expects to have its first work go to market by the end of the month.
With the focus on expansion in North America, founder and chief executive officer Sean Cummins will now split his time between New York and Toronto and will serve as head of Cummins & Partners Canada.
The Cummins name is a familiar one on the international advertising scene. One of the best-known marketers in Australia, Cummins made a name for himself globally with a sweep at the Cannes International Advertising Festival in 2009, when a campaign he helped create for Tourism Queensland, “Best Job In The World,” won three Grand Prix and five Gold Lions.
That same year he sold his agency, CumminsNitro, to Sapient, which re-branded as SapientNitro. In 2011, he opened CumminsRoss, now Cummins & Partners, an independent full-service agency.
While the Canadian market is new ground for Cummins professionally, the opening of an office here is actually something of a homecoming for the marketer, who is Canadian. Cummins was born in Toronto to Australian parents, who later moved the family back to Australia. Despite his long career there, Cummins has remained a Canadian citizen.
The executive team at Cummins & Partners also includes executive creative director and partner Andrew Shortt in addition to partner and president Dave Carey. Carey was previously senior vice-president of client services at Stone Canoe, while Shortt was a founding partner at HQvB.
One week before the agency’s launch, Carey, Shortt and Cummins met with their first round of hires in the Yonge St. space that will soon be home to the agency. The windows of the large second floor room look out onto the Eaton Centre – an unusual choice of real estate in a city in which most agencies are clustered west of the financial district or along Bloor St.
Cummins was pleased the selection is a mark of difference in the local marketing world. His main criteria, he said, was to be central and accessible for clients, but he also didn’t want to be surrounded by other agencies.
He’s hoping the points of difference will extend past real estate. His goal in the Canadian market, he said, is be an independent that punches above its weight and acts like a global shop, without being branded as a small or boutique firm. Ideally, Carey said Cummins & Partners would like to grow to an agency that hovers between a headcount of 100 and 120.
And while others tout a well-honed specialty, Cummins is bullish about the power of the one-stop shop – Cummins & Partners will offer creative, strategy and media.
For the next few weeks, Cummins, Carey and Shortt will be making that pitch to potential clients. In the first two weeks of April, Carey said the agency is meeting with nine CMOs, many of whom know Cummins from his work launching Virgin Airlines in Australia and the creative for Tourism Queensland and Jeep. (Cummins is behind the “I bought a Jeep” campaign, which helped transform the brand in Australia, most recently leading to a 37% year-over-year spike in sales in the market.)
“We get in the door with Sean,” Carey said. “It’s then [about] what we do when we get in.”
Likewise, Cummins said campaigns like “Best Job In The World” have become a calling card for him and the agency, but he said he’s now looking forward, not back.
“As much as people may know my work historically, you have to bake fresh daily,” he said.
