TBWAVancouver retains the name of a multinational, but two years ago its management team bought back the agency from its multinational network owners and returned it to its roots.
Now it’s a scrappy little shop that’s locally owned and managed, but still connected to the national and global resources of a major agency network through a franchise arrangement.
“We talk about it being the best of both worlds because we can make independent local decisions and work with clients who fi t our values without having to report to New York accountants,” says Andrea Southcott, president.
The current economic meltdown has spared few agencies and TBWA is no exception, with two of its top three clients slashing marketing budgets by more than 70%. But the agency has maintained both revenues and staffi ng levels, and picked up a slew of new business during the past year. New AOR wins includes Tourism Yukon, Okanagan Spring, YMCA, Canadian National Institute for the Blind, the B.C. Egg Marketing Board, BuySmart, Canadian National Brewers, the media assignment for Mercedes Benz Dealers (B.C.) as well as project work for Electronic Arts and Joey’s Restaurants .
TBWA won Best of Show for client B.C. Lottery Corporation at the Lotus Awards for the second year in a row and won eight awards overall. The agency picked up two Golds at the Bessies for the Vancouver International Film Festival and Silver at the Marketing Awards. TBWA has also seen entries in the One Show, Applied Arts and had clients BC Lung Association and Tourism Yukon featured in Communication Arts.
Bryce Zurowski, regional VP western Canada, Okanagan Spring Brewery, which awarded its account to TBWA in January, says he likes the fact that he’s dealing with a locally owned agency with world-class talent.
“After six years of stalled brand growth, the work by TBWA has reaffi rmed our leadership position in the category and vaulted us to a place of real aggressive growth again this past year,” he says, adding that the brewery is now hitting double-digit positive growth numbers. “They’ve pushed us into new mediums and they’ve helped move us from very functional type advertising to develop an emotional tone of voice for the brand.”
TBWA created a sponsorship program to support everyday events such as a backyard barbecue, a fi shing trip and a ping-pong tournament. An advertising campaign that included outdoor, print, radio and online, used real people to forge an emotional connection to the brand and gave the brand a 10% sales boost after the campaign launched in May.
A campaign for client Vancity promoting the credit union’s Jump Start account also helped push up last year’s revenues 43% compared to the previous year and delivered one of the bank’s strongest years ever for deposits.
Richard Seres, Vancity’s VP marketing, says in keeping with the values of the credit union, TBWA positioned the product as a unique high-interest savings account and showed how the community would benefi t.
In the television ad, a couple is shown lying facedown on a sidewalk, both in handcuffs. “Nobody said making a difference would be easy,” the man says to his partner . “Although, there is a high-interest savings account from Vancity…that donates a portion of their revenue to help fi ght poverty,” she answers. “So we can affect social change by saving up for something?” he asks.
In October, TBWA kicked off another round of bizarre cinema spots for long-time client the Vancouver International Film Festival. This year the theme “an open mind is advised” played off the warnings–sexuality, subtitles and disturbing–carried by many mainstream fi lms. The creative has always done well at annual awards shows, and Southcott says this year the feedback is that the ads are the best yet. “The campaign has been recognized around the world,” she says . “We are getting profi le in Europe and throughout North America.”
