In the June-August 2026 issue of NZ Marketing magazine, we asked agency founders to tell us the story behind why they started their agency, their favourite thing, what they’ve learned and their best advice.
Quantum Jump
- Founder: Ben Goodale
- Year founded: 2019
Tell us the story behind founding your agency.
Having sold my first agency justONE to Clemenger Group in 2013, I worked within the Group running 99 and justONE until late 2018, then took a year off.
People thought I was retiring. It was a chance to reset. Maybe I would open a wine bar, an art gallery or a Four Square? Rather quickly, former clients got in touch and asked if I might help with CRM, loyalty and digital.
It started as consulting, but it became clear that if I wanted to set up another agency, the demand was there. In particular, Jules Lloyd-Jones at Mitre 10, and Steve Bayliss (then at Sky TV), were huge supporters and helped me get my mojo back. I was loving it, back at the coalface, solving client challenges. The opportunity was to create a right-shaped agency for the new age of advertising, focused on data driven advertising, CRM and loyalty.
What’s your favourite thing about running your own agency?
Freedom. I’m not very good with rules and structure, so it was always a bit of a challenge being inside a network, albeit Clems were very good to me.
Being independent means it’s easier to choose to invest in people and resources, and to not have to worry about every last $ as we aren’t passing everything back to New York. That makes it all a bit more relaxing and we can focus on the client work rather than accounting.
We can also be much more choosy about who we work with as it’s our own decision, not driven by a P&L. When we decided to commission our own research into loyalty in NZ, we didn’t have to seek group permission or anything.
What’s the most important thing you’ve learned?
I don’t think it’s a revelation that people make the difference. I’ve been very fortunate to have had a lot of team members who’ve stuck with me over the years, or come and gone and come back again.
So Quantum Jump is a wonderful mix of former justONE team members (especially Drew Ayers, Amy Watson and Justin Biddle), Wayne Pick who I worked with at TEQUILA\ even before that, and more recent joins including Zoë Macdonald-Mair (our first hire!) and Helen McGrath, and Rachel Wintle who heads up our new Sydney offering.
We’ve a wonderful blend of deep experience and freshness with our digital natives. What our people bring is perspective, experience, expertise, but also curiosity and a sense of fun. As a crew, obviously many of us have enjoyed working together a long time, and that extends to many wonderful clients who have returned time and again.
What’s the best piece of advice you’ve received or given out?
I think the simplest one I always say to people is be a customer of the brands you work with.
Your experience as a customer is so different to the lens as a marketer, and it so often provides valuable insight. That thought also extends to simply being curious about the category, shopping within it and understanding it beyond the briefs or strategies that may come across your desk.
Anything else we should know?
We are the luckiest people, getting to work in an industry we love with great people – colleagues and clients.
Quantum Jump is a founder member of Agency Directory – find out more about them here.
This story comes from NZ Marketing magazine issue 87, June-August 2026. Why not subscribe? Get four issues a year for just $50 (including delivery) if you autorenew.
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