Sunrise in Miami Beach came far too early for Zulu Alpha Kilo’s founder and chief creative officer Zak Mroueh.
He’s functioning on less than two hours sleep and feeling the effect of one too many Coronas after celebrating the agency’s gold in Advertising Age’s annual Small Agency of the Year Awards.
“Sorry for rambling on – I’m on no sleep,” says Mroueh at one point, following a heartfelt monologue on Zulu’s commitment to retaining its core values regardless of size.
It’s an assertion that could soon be put to the test, with Mroueh himself acknowledging that becoming the first Canadian agency to win the award could be potentially transformative for the eight-year-old agency.
Zulu was among approximately 270 agencies from countries including the U.S., Mexico and England competing in the show – which honours independent agencies with a staff of 150 people or fewer.
It’s a long way from 2008, when Mroueh, fresh off reading a copy of Entrepreneurs for Dummies, spent a week trying to determine the purpose of his prospective agency. It certainly wasn’t money or accolades, both of which he had earned while a creative director at Taxi, working on clients including Telus, Canadian Tire and Mini Canada.
“We believe that creativity can help solve problems,” he says. “We want to use our creativity to help the world in our own small way; that’s part of our DNA.”
Advertising Age says Zulu’s win is based on factors including new business (Harley-Davidson) coupled with “stunning” work that includes the charming short “Lily & the Snowman” for Cineplex and the latest work in its “Be in the Black” platform for payment services firm Interac – including the “Toy Store” commercial and “Pets with Credit: A Dogumentary.”
The U.S. publication also lauds Zulu’s steadfast “no spec work” policy, which encourages Canadian agencies to take a stand against one of the most disliked aspects of the pitch process.
Mroueh says the recognition brings Zulu one step closer to its goal of attracting global clients to a Toronto-based shop, though he stresses the 85-person operation will remain a “values-based” company regardless of size.
“Smaller isn’t better, and we don’t think that just being a big agency is great,” says Mroueh. “I don’t care if we’re five or 500 people, as long as we stay true to who were are.”
Mroueh says he has no current plans to open additional Zulu offices, but acknowledges the win can “open up some doors” in the lucrative U.S. market. The agency doesn’t have any U.S. clients, though it did win a U.S. project for Canadian client Whoosh, which specializes in cleaning solutions for tech devices.
Advertising Age will profile Zulu in its August issue, which will also feature an ad from the agency proudly touting its independent status.
The ad shows the byzantine structure of the world’s leading agency holding companies, accompanied by the Zulu Alpha Kilo name and a straight line down to a sentence reading “Holding our own since 2008.”
Joining Mroueh at the awards was the agency’s executive committee: His wife Amanda (who works as the agency’s operations director), president Mike Sutton, and chief financial officer David So.
Mroueh says the win is validation of a process that began when he and Amanda mortgaged their house to launch Zulu in 2008. He credits his wife for helping get the business off the ground.
“When I resigned from Taxi and said ‘We’re going to mortgage our home and start an agency,’ she said ‘You’ve been talking about this for years – do it.’ How many partners would be willing to do that?”
