Type of agency: Creative Solutions
Company ownership: Independent
Key personnel: Kartik Iyer; Praveen Das, directors, co-founders
Accounts won: Hasbro Clothing Company, Wipro E.go Laptops, Wipro Servers, Fastrack Retail
Accounts lost: None
2009 may not have been a great year for this Bangalore based ideas shop, in terms of healthy new business but it added some small accounts, nevertheless, which helped in weathering out the recession. They lost one employee in the entire year but other than that managed to stay afloat without losing business. The agency won two awards this year at the Abbys and also got itself into the D&AD In-Book for packaging design for its client VF Arvind’s Lee Skinny Jeans. The elections provided an opportunity for Happy to work on politician Veerapa Moily’s campaign, where they created a song for his campaign trail. Besides this, work for Wipro’s E.go range of notebooks and Hasbro added to their portfolio of work. While the agency has produced some good work on Wipro and produced some clutter breaking work for Radio One with the character of Chamrajpet Charles, the fact remains that Happy needs a monster brand that can help it get noticed among the big boys. Being in Bangalore, the agency has some steady retail business in their portfolio, but it needs a big high profile business win to add scale and visibility.
Campaign Score: 7
How HAPPY rates itself: 7
This year has been good to us. We did quite well despite the recession. No delayed salaries or cut backs. We took the entire office to Goafest, where we won two awards. We created Veerappa Moily’s campaign. We scripted the Incredible India! film for Nirvana Films. We also got an in-book entry for packaging at D&AD. And we did some good stuff for our clients too. Changed the face of three brands - Basics, Genesis and Probase - delivering a resounding success. Created a new retail language for a retail chain called BASICS LIFE - from its name and identity across 47 stores nationally. We launched E.go notebooks in an otherwise blue grey PC laptop world, which we received colourfully. Not to mention the cool rub off on Wipro. And with more work coming our way, it only made sense to soup up the Happy team. So we added two new creative teams, six new employees. Moved to a bigger, promising new office. Launched our much discussed Happy employee handbook. And off the record, we have a COO joining us soon. Looks like it will get even better next year. Makes one happy to hope, doesn’t it?
