Big thinking, small clients

In 2016, my wife and I decided to change things up. We traded the hustle of Sydney for the calm of Sleepy Forster, four hours up north. Missing the Adland vibe, we kickstarted our own marketing agency and co-workspace.

Since then, I've used the skills I developed working with big clients to help much smaller ones – creating and designing brands, writing copy and content, delivering campaigns and building websites for small businesses and local councils.

Running a small agency and setting up a co-workspace has given me a new view of clients, their needs, and budgets. Balancing quality creativity with tight timelines and budgets as a small business owner is a challenge, but it's also been a chance to fine-tune my creative process.

MEMORABLE WORK

Over the past five years at Heath and Hoff, I've crafted numerous brands and websites for small businesses, delivered campaigns and toolkits for local councils, crafted a non-alcoholic beer brand and built an e-commerce platform for local artisanal producers. The most memorable piece of work has been the destination branding and website for the Barrington Coast – a region of New South Whales that I got to name.

Mid Coast Council

Central Coast Council

Farm to Fridge

Nusa Indah Surfboards

Coastal Brewing Co

Choux Patisserie

Remarkable brands, Meaningful change

I’ve worked as The Brand Pool’s Creative Director since 2016. During this time, I have helped the agency bolster its creative offering, winning several significant pitches that have led to the delivery of brand and campaign for clients like the Visit Newcastle, NSW RFS and NSW DPI Fisheries.

In 2023, I proposed repositioning and rebranding the agency to focus on its strengths – branding, EVPs, and behavioural change campaigns. This has helped to strengthen the agency’s offering.

Leading a small, nimble team enabled me to hone my process and lean into working with production partners to deliver larger projects where film, photography and animation played a key role in the execution.

MEMORABLE WORK

I have enjoyed working across a number of rewarding government clients including the Rural Fire Service and SES (total heroes) as well as the NSW DPI Fisheries (a personal favourite as I am a keen fisherman).

I have particularly enjoyed projects such as Seek Off Beat, where a key insight has significantly defined the work, shaping the strategy, narrative, identity and campaign.

Identifying and utilising guiding insights has become a key factor in the evolution of my creative process.

NSW Rural Fire Service (RFS)

NSW DPI Fisheries

City of Newcastle

Lake Macquarie City

Australian Securities & Investments Commission (ASIC)

NSW GOV

Evolving my process

My role as Associate Creative Director saw me leading both creative and design teams and managing the agency’s creative output.

When I started, Webling was a production-heavy digital development agency. I became responsible for the evolution of the creative process, introducing a briefing system and bringing a new level of creative thinking to the team.

After JWT acquired the agency, I further expanded the creative capabilities and collaborated with JWT creatives to guide their thinking in digital.

Throughout my tenure, I built a diverse and motivated department and worked hard to foster a sense of mateship, inspiration and craftsmanship in my team and the wider agency.

What they said

"Benny was an inspiring and creative team-leader with a keen eye for the details. A pleasure to work with and admired by the department."

Jay Morgan | Group Creative Director

MEMORABLE WORK

My work at Webling/JWT was mostly digitally based, from launching the NSW GOV website to working on campaign microsites and product-based sites, but there were some exceptions… building an interactive exhibition for Macquarie Bank and branding a festival like a giant ice cream for the Lederer Group.

Macquarie Bank

NSW GOV

ACER Computers

Mattel

Lederer Group

SOFY / Unicharm

Leading the charge

As creative lead, I was heavily involved in the day-to-day running, mentoring and managing the creative department. I was responsible for making new hires to bolster the creative capabilities of the team, as well as being a primary sign-off point for work.

I also worked in a creative team, where my role as art director was focused on steering the course of projects conceptually and visually from ideation to execution. This allowed me to develop my creative and conceptual thinking skills.

Day-to-day tasks involved adapting global ATL creative for local digital markets and creating concepts from the ground up. Working across a wide client base and varied scale of projects allowed me to develop a creative process that I have since built upon.

I worked on many large accounts at Holler, like Audi, Heineken and Lion Nathan, and Rekkit Benkiser brands like Mortein, Durex, and Vanish.

What they said

"I worked with Benny for nearly 4 years. Not as many as I would have liked. He is one of the good guys, not just in his ability as a creative but also in his approach. He's a good person down to the bones; ethical, caring for his team, calm under pressure, and hard-working. I could go on for a while. I'd hire him again in a heartbeat and fully intend to if he'll let me"

Mike Hill | CEO

MEMORABLE WORK

There are a few pieces that come to mind, like getting Professor Splash to take a high-dive into 30cm of tomato ketchup for Vanish; using drones (when that was cool) to follow an Audi Q4 across the Australian Landscape; hacking the internet to make users legendary skill and their name appear everywhere; creating huge engagement on social with weekly Bin Brother series.

Audi Australia

Bonds

Heineken

Mortein

Vanish

Coca Cola

Developing design efficiencies

I pushed my design skills and creative thinking at Albion, where I acted as digital design lead across key clients like telco GiffGaff.

With GiffGaff, I initiated a ‘bootstrap’ approach to development and created UI guidelines and a design process that enabled quick and accurate delivery of digital assets.

What they said

"Ben is a fantastic designer in any digital format. He's also universally liked and respected. He is a very calm presence under pressure; he is thoughtful, fast and meticulous in his response.

Most importantly, Ben is fun to work with. I can't recommend Ben highly enough - a talented and lovely bloke."

Nick Darken | Group Creative Partner

MEMORABLE WORK

Working on GiffGaff was always memorable, as well as developing the UI design, and I remember being roped into wearing a pink GiffGaff gimp suit as part of the ‘hire a helper’ campaign.

Slapometer (a site that lets you virtually slap political candidates when they say something you disagreed with during live televised debates) was probably the most memorable piece of work. As a pro-active piece, it helped establish a camaraderie within the team, and it certainly made waves with all the PR and coverage it achieved.

Giff Gaff

Air New Zealand

Visit Britain

Where it started

The most unforgettable years of my career were spent as a designer at Agency Republic. I learned from and collaborated with some of the most talented people I ever worked with and made lifelong friends.

I mainly worked on the O2 telco account designing and animating ‘in-banner’ mini-games, but I also created a few microsites and apps along the way.

What they said

"We had the pleasure of Ben's company for roughly two and a half years here at Agency Republic. During that time, he worked across a wide variety of our clients, including O2, the COI and Diageo. His design skills are varied, and he is particularly strong with illustration and animation.

A lovely bloke, very sociable, and universally liked by his colleagues."

Gavin Gordon-Rogers | Executive Creative Director

MEMORABLE WORK

One of my favourite projects was ‘It’s Sunshine O’Clock’ for PIMMS, an online sunshine finder that lived on Timeout.com/London and enabled users to locate pub gardens and parks nearby and check what times they have sunshine in them. Note that this was before the dawn of the iPhone.

We worked on several drinks brands at Republic; the first site I designed was for Captain Morgan’s Spice Rum - I can still taste the hangover.

O2

Sony Playstation

Pimms

Morgan’s Spiced

British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC)

Mercedes-Benz