Twenty years is a long time in business, but you would be surprised how quickly time flies when you’re in the thick of it and working hard to create a thriving business that has longevity.
In this blog, I’m taking a trip down memory lane in celebration of our 20th birthday to reflect on the journey that’s got us to where we are today and what the future looks like for The Dairy.
The start of a memorable journey
I remember the day we first opened our doors. Three friends stepping into the unknown world of managing our own marketing and design agency. With a designer, copywriter and account director, we had the perfect recipe for a successful agency’s first steps into a very competitive industry.
Our first proper pitch was to Bravissimo – yes, Bravissimo. We had only been in business a matter of three weeks and we went into the pitch expecting it to be purely practise for future pitches – nothing more. I was bold with my approach, claiming to know more about bras and knickers than their owner/founder due to my father’s background manufacturing ladies underwear in Nottingham’s Lace Market. I used to sell his second’s on Arnold market in my teens, so I knew a fair bit about how to market and sell such garments.
My bold mindset was to pay off, with us given the contract for Bravissimo’s marketing in its fledgling years. What followed, really set us up for our future – making a profit in our first year and developing a partnership with Bravissimo which lasted for several years. It was this client that gave us the confidence to win other big name clients such as The National Trust.
Some might say we got lucky securing Bravissimo in our first month of operating, but it tested our creativity, mentality, skill and effort to win it and make it a success. Those four key characteristics are ones which every marketing professional and agency owner needs. It also fast tracked our ability to purchase new premises and grow the team in the early years – although we didn’t get everything right to begin with.
Staying true to our principles
We made some naive decisions early on – as do many who are new to running their own business – and then the financial crisis hit us hard in the late 2000s. But fast forward another decade and I think that those characteristics of creativity, skill, effort and having the right mentality have served us well and seen us enjoy many highs, while riding out the occasional lows.
Clients respect the fact that we’re open and honest. They respect our experience and our clever mix of professionalism and personality, and they appreciate the blend of youthful exuberance we’ve injected into the team by developing a younger generation of marketers. We’ve found a sweet spot now where we’ve matured as an agency, found our place, and are able to attract new opportunities through reputation – rather than ‘knocking on doors’.
This is a position that many agencies strive to be in and for many, it’s one they never attain. It’s a cut throat industry. Making a dent is incredibly difficult and even though the barriers to entry are minimal, staying there and growing a reputation is an uphill challenge.
Proud of what we’ve achieved, but the hard work isn’t over
As we now reflect on two decades of creativity, I can certainly look back with pride. We’ve worked hard to build an honest, reliable, creative team that our clients love working with – and we have definitely achieved that. Our enviable list of projects and proven track record now sees us attracting interest from the sorts of brands we want to work with. A great position to be in.
I’d also like to take this opportunity to thank all of our current and former clients for their support over the past 20 years. Without you, we wouldn’t be the agency we are today.
When I look to the future, all I can feel is excitement. While I am certainly taking more of a back seat these days and letting the ‘younguns’ shape what the next twenty years look like, with my guiding hand to support them, I look to the coming years as an exciting new chapter for the business. I’m proud of the legacy that The Dairy will leave and I know that with the team we now have in place, we will reach new heights together in the not too distant future.
Our internal motto is no complacency, more creativity. I know that the team is fully invested in that mindset and I would like to thank each and every one of them for their hard work and dedication. Our people make us who we are, and we have some of the best people you could wish for.
It’s time for us to now enjoy a hard earned slice of Dairy birthday cake and pint of best, before doing it all over again.
To the next twenty years!
Nigel Rowlson
Managing Director
