DUKE Group
2017-2020I built DUKE alongside incredible partners - the now chairman of the ACA Wayne Naidoo, and the ex-global head of innovation for SABMiller Steve Miller. There were four of us when I joined. When I left 3.5 years later, there were 80.
The agency’s positioning is ’Thrive in tumultuous times’. An ambitious promise to find ways for businesses to become comfortable in discomfort and to leverage the best of challenger brand tactics to turn tight budgets into big results.
We took a staunch stance against pitches, vocally putting it out in the media. And as a result, we won more clients than pitch invites we had to turn down.
When the pandemic kicked in, it was our moment to truly test our positioning. And I’m proud to say that we lived up to everything we promised. The agency grew by 23.8% in the face of the pandemic.
The agency soon became several agencies and continues to grow and thrive. This included Dialogue (PR and influencer marketing); Duchess (production specialists); DUKE Design (packaging and branding specialists); Mark1 (AdTech and Digital marketing specialists); DUKE Social (Content and social media specialists); and of course, DUKE - the group’s lead agency which housed our strategic and creative leads.
My final year with the agency (my wife and I elected to return to the UK), we were rated South Africa’s best medium agency by The Financial Mail’s AdFocus Awards, in the face of a stellar lineup of multinationals.
The agency and team continue to grow with the agency being consistently rated as one of South Africa’s most creative agencies, as well as a leader from a business perspective.
Here’s how they’re doing now: duke.co.za
Recognition:
Financial Mail
2020 Medium Agency Of The Year
2020 Transformation Award (diversity) - Top three
2019 Medium Agency Of The Year - Top two
2018 Small Agency Of The Year - Top three
MarkLives
2020 South African agency to watch - Runner-up
2019 Cape Town agency to watch
Loerie Awards
2019 2nd ranked MEA small agency
2018 3rd ranked MEA small agency
