David Donald, The Brand Agency and St John Ambulance top 2015 CBWA Creative Rankings

No-one will be surprised that The Brand Agency’s David Donald (pictured) and Craig Buchanan lead this year’s Campaign Brief Creative Rankings. Their ‘Break The Barrier’ TVC for St John Ambulance was the stand-out work of the past year, and garnered awards locally, nationally and internationally. Its haul included Silver at The London International Awards and Bronze at Clio, Silver at AWARD, Bronze at New York Festivals and capped it all with a Graphite Pencil (previously Silver Nomination level) at D&AD – the world’s toughest award show.

It put Donald and Buchanan miles ahead of anyone else on this year’s list. And they could have been even further ahead had they not forgotten to enter ‘Break The Barrier’ into The One Show!

Donald edged Buchanan for the #1 ranking due to his work on the St John Ambulance ‘Sheep’ and ‘Spa’ press ads with freelance writer Mitch Mitchell. That campaign received two Finalists and a Best of Year at the Campaign Brief Awards in March, which gave Donald an additional 80 points.

A long-serving member of The Brand Agency’s creative department, it is Donald’s first time at the top of the Rankings. He was also recognized as the town’s top creative by the PADC, which awarded him its inaugural Diamond Skull in March.

Buchanan is one of Perth’s most experienced and well-known creatives, who has been with The Brand Agency since its formation more than 20 ago. This is also his highest CB ranking for 20 years and shows that he has rediscovered the form that made him one of Perth’s most highly regarded creatives in the agency’s first decade from the mid 1990s to 2000s. Based solely on PADC Awards, he was the #1 ranked Perth creative in 1995.

Members of Marketforce’s very collaborative creative department occupy the next six positions. They are led by Alida Henson and Megan Riley, whose ‘Go Buoy’ idea was one of the agency’s highlights.

Guy Howlett, Neil Martin, Ben Green and Pat Lennox fill 5th to 7th.

303Lowe Creative Director Richard Berney is at #9. Berney’s best showing was at the Campaign Brief Awards, where he picked up 3 Finalists and 2 Best of Years to go with a Silver, Bronze and Best of Category at the PADCs.

Rounding out the Top Ten is JWT Perth Creative Director Dav Tabeshfar, whose year was highlighted by Finalists at AWARD and New York Festivals. Tabeshfar has an unusual role, working with both local and JWT network creatives on the agency’s output. This result shows he has managed the task well to deliver quality work for his clients.

At #11, Mitch Mitchell missed making the Top Ten by a whisker – a fine effort for a freelancer. Besides the ‘Sheep’ and ‘Spa’ press ads, Mitchell also won the $20,000 Southern Cross Austereo Radio Writers Award with his ‘Barrier’ radio commercial for St John.

Just behind him, Meerkats junior writer Emil Cholich is one to watch. A former PADC Student Award and AWARD School winner, Cholich has rocketed up 25 places from #37 in 2014 to #12, after little more than two years in the industry. He is Meerkats highest-ranked creative and a Top Ten placing in the next year or two would not be a surprise.

Overall, 49 creatives received points for this year’s rankings, compared to 56 last year.

Of course, the performance of ‘Break The Barrier’ has also put The Brand Agency on top of the agency rankings – for the first time ever. It has been the #2 ranked agency on several occasions, including last year, but this is the first time it has been #1 since Campaign Brief began formally ranking agencies.

The Brand Agency enjoyed a very successful PADCs and Campaign Brief Awards but local shows only represented 34% of its points. It was ‘Break The Barrier’s’ performance internationally that delivered this milestone result. It is testament to the work of the whole agency but especially Buchanan as CD and Paul Yole as Director of Agency Development to lift its creative output.

The Brand is well ahead of last year’s top-ranked agency, Marketforce, which slips back a spot after two years at #1. Marketforce’s points came from work for a spread of clients, which was highlighted by the agency’s performance at the PADCs: 1 Gold, 2 Silver, 11 Bronze and 1 Best of Category for clients including Rottofest, iiNet, Internode, HBF and Curtin. It had international success at Clio and One Show, and nationally picked up a Bronze at AWARD.

After those two agencies it was daylight to #3 ranked 303Lowe, #4 Meerkats and #5 SHEDcsc. The challenge is there for those and other agencies to make it more than a two-horse race next year. 13 agencies garnered points this year, the same number as last year.

Client-wise St John Ambulance’s points total is more than three times that of second-ranked Internode. Apart from the ‘Break The Barrier’ tvc, other work for St John that garnered points included Crash Test and the ‘Barrier’ radio spot.

The #3 ranked ‘client’ is Go Buoy. The clients for this ambient idea around the Rottnest Channel Swim have been variously credited as iiNet, 96FM and Rottnest Island Authority so we have grouped them as one.

The Valentine’s Day press ad for IKEA continued to pick up points with a Silver at AdStars and a finalist at Clio. It saw IKEA ranked as the #4 client, and its creators – Helen King and Alex Bolderoff – still placed in the top twenty despite having moved to Sydney agency BMF in September last year.

In total, 34 clients received points compared to 33 in 2014 (albeit that we counted Go Buoy as 1). In a sign of how quickly things can change, last year’s #1 ranked client, Perth Zoo, dropped off the list altogether.

The 2015 Campaign Brief WA Creative Rankings were based on performance at award shows from June 2014 to May 2015 (Cannes to New York Festivals). The shows that were included were: