Get involved in the largest grassroots social media fundraising initiative in the world and raise money for charity at the same time? Don’t mind if we do.
Our super smart design team (particular thanks to our Fraz!) have put together this very snazzy identity for the Edinburgh event, scheduled for July. The charity of choice is still to be announced but we do hope we’ll see you there.
Find out more here http://edinburgh.twestival.com/
To help Scottish Rugby make rugby appeal to a wider audience we’ve created some work for the Emirates Airline Glasgow 7s.
Everyone knows there’s great rugby to watch. Most people don’t know that it’s the fancy dress theme that makes it a real party weekend. To honour this year’s movie theme we created some familiar looking posters with a rugby twist.
We’ve been working with an exciting new food brand from Fife. To reflect the care and craft put into the product, we put a lot of care and craft into this work that’s aimed at people who know and love their food. Go on, feast your eyes on five hundred words describing the delicious nature of Trotter’s Independent Condiments.
Our first Road Safety work for the Scottish Government features 13-times Grand Prix winner David Coulthard demonstrating how even the best drivers in the world have to adjust their speed on country roads.
The campaign includes TV, cinema, radio, online and interactive 6-sheets, as well as field marketing, B2B, PR and social media.
Our new ad for Scotland's newest ale dramatises the settle of its lovely creamy pour. As a man's life settles, so does his Caledonia Best.
Tennent's asked the Scottish public to tell them what captured Scotland to a T and they replied in their droves. From the warmest and wittiest comments received, we wrote and animated a special toast celebrating all the things that make people smile about our great country. The nation's comments were also immortalised on a Limited Edition pint glass that was launched in bars on St. Andrew's day. Here's T that.
Our campaign for Tennent's Original Export saw Hugh and Barnes travelling the world like a pair of Victorian Alan Whickers. Our posters also got a lot of notice across Scotland with consumers even sending in their own suggestions for executions.
The Twin Towns campaign has also been picking up awards including the Grand Prix at the 2012 Scottish Creative Awards.
Our low-budget film for Bawbags was shortlisted with some of the biggest agencies in the world at Cannes this year. Which is nuts.
It's a victory not quite up there with Bannockburn, but we've helped Historic Scotland get a bit more fame. They've been named client of the year at the Roses Advertising Awards in Manchester with them being commended for "the bravery of their work."
Since our Hugh Tennent campaign began sales have increased to a record level, and Tennent's has maintained its position as the favourite lager brand of 18-24 year olds.
Our work for ScottishPower continues to drive high response and brand warmth during tough times.
Our campaign for The Children's Panel has been a resounding success. It has over-delivered on recruitment targets by 70%, been noticed creatively across the world and has produced a return on investment of 12:1. Even more importantly, the work is helping to make a real difference to the lives of Scotland's most vulnerable children.
Our first bit of work for City A.M. was a simple idea, but already it's had a big impact for them.
"We were keen to drive sign-up to City A.M.'s digital daily newsletter. Newhaven quickly turned around 3 or 4 strong pieces of creative and worked with us closely to develop a final product. Within the first week the ad increased our subscribers by 1,500. Growth continues with the work created by Newhaven achieving some of the best click-thru rates." Harry Owen, Publishing Director, City A.M.
From a standing start we created 77% awareness of Ageism issues across Scotland in one campaign.
These simple posters for our favourite patisserie got a local shop worldwide publicity when they were published in Luerzer's Archive magazine.
Following the launch of our recent radio campaign, the helpline received almost 8 times the volume of calls it had received previously. On the creative side, it received a Yellow Pencil Nomination at D&AD and Commendation at Creative Circle.
In 2012, we created work for Poppy Scotland to support Billy Strathdee's Calais to John O'Groats Challenge. The work and charity auction we organised in our art space was such a success it raised £10,000 to help Billy and wounded servicemen and women. Sadly, Billy passed away on Thursday 16th of February 2012, but his memory lives on and the money he has raised is making a real difference to people's lives.
And if all the above wasn’t enough, here’s a wee montage of some of the other stuff we’ve created.
Since winning the Cycling Scotland account we’ve been trying to help our client and the cycling community in as many ways as we can and we’re delighted to be involved in the first ever Edinburgh Festival of Cycling in June. The festival offers everything from a bamboo bike-building workshop (in our very own Ambulance Depot) and BBQ, to talks from Mark Beaumont, Kate Rawles on the Carbon Cycle and Juliana Buhring, the fastest woman to circumnavigate the world by bike. You can even take part in a 24 hour Spinathon we’ve organised with Edinburgh company, LifesCycles. Plus, we’re delighted to be hosting Wiggo and his Tour de France compatriots courtesy of award-winning photographer Pete Godings’ stunning photography. The festival runs from 15 to 23 June so do come visit.
We did well at last week’s Roses Awards in Manchester, a celebration of the best creative work outside of the M25. We entered three pieces of work and walked away with two awards, a Gold for Best Food and Drink Ad for our work for Tennent’s Export and a Silver for Best Digital Film for Bawbags.
We've been working with Jonathan's dream client, Scottish Racing, for the past few months to help them reach new audiences across their 5 racetracks in Scotland. The Musselburgh Easter Sunday Family Day was our first test. Our radio and online campaign targeted families, trying to tempt them along with Peppa Pig and a colourful array of magicians, face painters and free chocolate eggs. But as the day approached and the weather steadily worsened, we felt increasingly apprehensive. But in fact, the campaign proved a test case for one of the unique benefits of digital activity. Unlike most forms of media spend, we were able to scale down (as the weather worsened) and scale up (when the forecast took a turn for the better) our search activity to respond to circumstances. Ticket sales served as a neat demonstration of the wisdom of this approach. And we're looking forward to applying our learnings to the next campaign.
Our latest exhibition, A thing to go to, from graduate students from Edinburgh College of Art, opens in the depot on May 3rd. Come along and be inspired.
Check out www.theoldambulancedepot.co.uk if you are interested in hearing more about our schedule of events throughout the year.
To make sure she was learning from the master, the IPA were kind enough to invite Claire to the inaugural address from incoming President, Ian Priest at their annual Members Lunch. Nicola Mendelsohn will be a hard act to follow but Ian delivered a cracking speech outlining his vision for adland that saw agencies and clients working hand in hand to deliver what he dubbed "commercial creativity". Keeping our client's business objectives at the fore and then deploying creativity through the most appropriate channels to deliver against those commercial objectives, we'll end up in a "win-win" situation. Fingers crossed.
Here's the speech in all its tonally modulated glory. Claire's the one in the back row clutching the "hello mum" sign.
At Newhaven, we’re really lucky to have a bit of a collection of slightly eclectic, old buildings attached to ours. And even luckier to be able to cram them full of brilliantly interesting and talented people.
Our brand new resident is Kevin Harman – Edinburgh based, internationally renowned artist.
Kevin has taken up residence in our studio space in the back garden, and we are delighted that he has. We are already intrigued by the assortment of artful objects being carried in…Watch this space.
We're delighted to say we have been nominated for 3 awards in the upcoming Roses Creative Awards. This awards show, held in Manchester each year, sets out to recognise great creative thinking across advertising, design and digital disciplines. Our film for Bawbags has been nominated in the Online film category and our Twin Towns work for Tennent's has been nominated in the Food and Drink and Outdoor categories. We'll be keeping our fingers crossed until the ceremony next month!
We’re excited to tell you that our very own Claire Wood has been announced as the new incoming Chairman of the IPA for Scotland and we couldn’t be more excited for her.
She’ll be welcomed into her new role on May 7th at a swanky members reception, where we’ll be sure to be heckling her / listening intently to her 2 year agenda from the front row.
So, what did I know about Newhaven Communications before my internship started? That it was a wee agency with a big reputation, and that a lot of impressive stuff came out of the former print works down an alleyway off Leith Walk. Naturally I assumed that it would be full of intimidating Mad Men characters with no time for interns. I could not have been more wrong.
We’re very excited to announce that we have been appointed to work with Cycling Scotland following a strategic and creative pitch. It’s a brilliant time for cycling in Scotland, from country roads to city streets. It’s playing an increasing role in how we get around, keep healthy and fuel the economy.
We're already getting stuck in with the team at Cycling Scotland. We want to create stuff that people will talk about, and can help bring an end to the ‘them and us’ culture that often prevails on Scotland’s roads. On your bike!
Campaignbrief UK, a must read for creatives throughout the industry, finally launched in the UK last month, and voted Newhaven number 11 in their rankings of best agencies in Britain! The results were based on points awarded on bestadsontv.com over the last two years. Pretty good eh? Chris and Rufus even scored joint 7th position for Top Creative Directors in the UK.
We recently pitched for, and won (hurrah!) the Road Safety Scotland account. The initial brief asked to develop strategy and creative addressing the issue of people driving at inappropriate speed on Scotland’s country roads. Our answer was a campaign featuring former F1 driver David Coulthard, an idea that won us the account. From there it was action stations. We were in charge of securing DC, and after many phone calls to Monte Carlo, the man from the Grand Prix said yes!
Earlier in the month we hosted an evening seminar here at Newhaven for all the eager youngsters sitting the IPA’s Foundation Certificate exam.
The aim was to provide an insight into the day-to-day reality and a more hands-on perspective of the industry from a few wise (if only slightly older) heads.
Napier University run the only course in Scotland that is designed specifically to train would-be creatives in how to write ads.
Claire Wood, one of our planners, has been helping them see the importance of strategy in this process.
A few months ago, Newhaven swapped Edinburgh’s cobbled streets for the bright lights of Blackpool, for a weekend of good old-fashioned fun.
The seaside town didn’t disappoint. A trip to the legendary Funny Girls Cabaret bar, less legendary Soul Suite, Comedy Carpet, Illuminations and North Pier were all enjoyed. Ken lost his glasses, Aron lost his dignity and we all went home. Here’s to the next glamorous agency outing!
In November D&AD rolled into town and Rufus marched off to represent Newhaven. The day kicked off with industry alumni (and Rufus) passing on pearls of wisdom around the theme of ‘Making your mark, how to stand out in creative practice’. This was followed by a jam-packed afternoon of workshops where students figured out ways to self promote themselves to the industry.
