How Bastion Shine’s big pivot has created a different kind of agency
Like many businesses, the catalyst for reinvention at Bastion Shine came in 2020, when Covid shut down the country. Realising the post-pandemic world would look quite different to the one before it, successful indie ad agency Shine made some bets. Today, it’s clear those bets were the right ones. Back then, though, it was far less certain.
“Our first conclusion was that things would be tighter than ever, from an advertising-budget perspective,” says Bastion Shine founder, Simon Curran.
“We figured, as history shows, that ad budgets would be the first to be cut, despite all the evidence suggesting that was a bad move for business. In almost the same breath, though, we recognised that organisations would still be required by boards and shareholders to drive successful outcomes. In short, they’d need to deliver more with less.”
‘More with less’ has been a consistent theme in the marketing world for a number of years now, and the Bastion Shine ownership team reckoned it wasn’t going away anytime soon.
“We started to think about success, and specifically about growth in organisations and what drives that for them,” says partner and CSO, Andy McLeish.
“Of course, marketing is one tool at a business’s disposal, but there are many others. We decided to take a big leap and build out an offering that moved away from just marketing and advertising, and into driving growth.”
Taking on the big consultancies
Bastion Shine recognised that high-level strategic capability was a fundamental enabler of growth, so they beefed up their offering, developing into commercial strategy, product strategy and helping organisations to build powerful DNA and direction.
“We could also see that globally, human capital or the performance of your people was becoming recognised
as one of the most fundamental drivers of organisational success and growth,” says McLeish.
“Big players like Sequioa Capital were investing heavily in this space within their investments, so we decided to build best-in-class capability in people and performance coaching.”
This sounds like a real departure from the core of an advertising agency or marketing consultancy, and Curran agrees. “This was probably the biggest pivot for Bastion Shine as a business, and the biggest risk, but it’s the fastest-growing part of our organisation, and unlocking real value for both our clients and ourselves.”
Curran and his team now run executive coaching and performance programmes, and strategic consultancy for many of New Zealand’s largest corporates. And they work with global businesses including Xero, Warner Bros Discovery and Google.
“When you think about it, it makes sense,” says McLeish. “We can work with an executive team to build team performance. Part of that’s around setting shared organisational direction and DNA, and then embedding that
into the wider organisation.
“We’ve built real expertise in this area and of course that dovetails with external brand strategy and commercial strategy. The creative part follows, as do a number of our other capabilities.”
Those capabilities now include technology consulting; high-end graphic, spatial and experience design; PR; corporate communications; social; and content creation to augment the creative product that has long been at the heart of Bastion Shine’s business.
“Commercial creativity has always been a big part of what we do, and it always will be,” says CCO, Rich Maddocks. “We create ideas that shift the dial for clients’ businesses, and we’re now able to apply that creativity to a more diverse range of areas within organisations.”
‘Integration’ is the word
Curran concurs with Maddocks’ sentiment.
“In the ideal world for us, and actually for our clients, all of these areas are integrated. Organisations will have great partners that deliver each of the capabilities we offer, but the cracks and gaps between these services – such as a gap between internal culture and external brand strategy, or where there’s a disconnect between marketing stack and marketing plan – create inconsistency and inefficiency.
“Money falls through those cracks for businesses, and they can’t afford that anymore, so we try to bring everything together, from high-level strategy and direction right through to how a business shows up internally
with staff and on their social channels, for example. That’s where we think real effectiveness and efficiencies
can be found.”
Amplifying the positive
To that end, Bastion Shine have recently launched an end-to-end social offering, delivering clients fast, efficient and effective social while utilising best-in-class capability. They now deliver an integrated model of strategy, media, planning and community management, through to creative, full production and reporting.
“Bastion Amplify is the PR business we launched a year ago and it’s growing really fast,” says Bastion Amplify’s
GM, Joanna James.
“We now have an eight-person team and it’s expanding every week. Working with the other areas of our business, such as creative, design and our production business Bastion Make, has enabled us to launch this new integrated social offering.”
The digital world has evolved and integrated too. Head of Bastion Digital, Melissa Harris, says: “From a digital
point of view, we’re able to work with all areas of the wider business to bring together brand experience, customer experience and technology experience in a seamless and cohesive way.
“We think it’s unique to be able to offer this breadth, and our clients are really enjoying the linked-up nature of what we do as a group.”
Today, Bastion Shine – as they’re now called after a majority buyout (the Shine owners are still shareholders and run the business day to day) – is a multi-faceted consultancy that’s helping some of New Zealand’s largest corporates to find the growth they seek.
They’re striving for the illusive ‘best of both worlds’ between a creative business and a management consultancy.
The comfortable middle ground
Curran says of the position they’ve carved out: “We’ve found a niche because we see agencies really struggle to build true capability in the high-end strategic or consulting space. They’ll typically have a strong suit in one thing – creative, digital, retail, whatever – but it’s rare to find one that has the depth and balance in so many areas that we’ve been able to build, and the consultancies, despite significant investment, have struggled in this part of the world to really build strong credentials in the creative space. We have both, and it’s proven to be a great place to be.”
Global CEO of Bastion Group, Jack Watts, who bought a majority stake in Shine a couple of years ago, had this
to say: “What attracted us to Shine was the fact they’re unique in New Zealand, and in fact, Australia too. They
have a market-leading strategic and creative offering, as well as strings to their bow that no one else has.
“Commercial strategy, business-model consulting, tech consulting and high-performance coaching… We reckon this model is where the ad industry is heading and where the consultancies are trying to head. Shine’s just got there first, and we’re happy to be there with them.”
So where to next for Bastion Shine in New Zealand? MD of Bastion Creative, Toby Sellers, sums it up well.
“We’ve been busy reorganising ourselves to meet changing client needs in a changing world, but the job is never actually done. The rate of change is only likely to increase, and there are threats and opportunities at every turn, so we’ll continue evolving our offering to make sure we stay relevant, useful and ultimately a valuable partner for our clients’ businesses.
“That’s what’s really exciting about being part of such a dynamic industry.”
For more information, email [email protected] or visit bastionshine.co.nz.
This article was first published in our March/April 2024 issue.
