Made in Leith – Dock

At this time of year we at The Leith like to pause for a moment to reflect on the events of the year, remember the important things in life and really stop to think about the true spirit of Christmas. As part of this we’ve developed a characteristically wholesome and heart warming Christmas Card for IRN-BRU.

Devised by 2 of our young creative upstarts Jim Swan and Sam Muir and lovingly crafted by the good people at Ink Digital, the finished piece has become something of an agency favourite. Steal a peek while you can as this is not available in shops.

“Don’t be British” was just one of Lara Morgan‘s pieces of wisdom for selling and growing a business, at a no-nonsense talk on the Leith barge last night. Be less polite about it, just close the deal.

It was a straight-talking account of how Lara built Pacific Direct, starting with selling pre-threaded sewing kits in her front room, to growing it to 400 staff and eventually selling the business for £20 million 17 years later. What came through loud and clear was a dogged determination and competitiveness to make sales. When asked how she landed one of her biggest accounts, the answer was simple: “I rang them up every day for three years, sometimes three times a day”.

But there was also real creativity in how she made sales. One client baulked at a quote saying it was “painful”, so was told to expect something the next day that would relieve his pain. The following morning he received a tube of Savlon. He’s still got it in desk drawer. And needless to say he accepted the quote.

Even Rocco Forte couldn’t escape, and was threatened with actually being sent a kitchen sink, unless he returned her calls. He picked up the phone after that.

Another piece of advice was to be open and transparent in management. Tell staff how the company is doing. Create a culture where everyone is involved in the highs and lows and is invested in making it work.

And be creative with your management. She paid for staff to go and stay in hotels to see what competitors were doing with their products, and present back on what they were doing better. Staff training, staff entertainment and product development rolled into one. She convinced The Times to run her recruitment ad horizontally, to show how this was a different kind of company. She even put a rose on everyone’s desk on February 13th, to make sure everyone felt a little bit loved regardless of what they got on the 14th. It doesn’t cost a lot to be different, just good ideas and the drive to do them.

So Lara’s set the bar incredibly high for the first in the series of Leithal Thinking Presents. There’ll be more, and if you’re interested in coming to the next one, you can add your name to the list here.

This event was hosted in partnership with Lister McDonald, who enable leaders and businesses to clarify what they want to cause, and empower them to make it a reality.

Lara Morgan has also just brought out a book, More Balls Than Most, available to buy here. And to find out more about what Lara is up to now, check out Company Shortcuts, a collection of frameworks for budding entrepreneurs to do business right.  As it says on the back of her business card, if you’re thinking of setting up or improving a business, “stop fannying about” and do it.

Read more at LeithalThinking.com

Yesterday our first TV ad for Baxters since Leith won the business broke during Downton Abbey.

With no TV presence since 2006 Baxters soups have fallen down priority lists for some people despite the top quality ingredients and unique recipes that they offer.

So the brief to us was to warm the brand up by injecting a real sense of emotion into the advertising, making it relevant and meaningful to consumers once again.

Shot in the stunning Kyle of Lochalsh and featuring none other than Terry “Really Wild Show” Nutkins’ house and the most charming dog you’re ever likely to meet, “Lochside” is brought to you by Mr Farrell and Phil Evans, directed by the lovely Alex Telfer and produced by MTP.

Leithal Thinking is proud to present Lara Morgan; a highly successful and straight-talking entrepreneur, inspirational business mentor, author, public speaker, and passionate advocate for businesses and entrepreneurial culture.

Tuesday 25th October, 6.30pm for 7pm until 9pm.

The Leith Barge
The Shore
Leith EH6 6QN.
View map

Register your place now

Having founded Pacific Direct in 1991, a business that revolutionised the hotel amenities market (everything from toliteries to sewing kits), Lara sold a 99% holding in the company for £20m in 2008. This experience and her passion for business took Lara to where she is today: driving an ambitious plan to support entrepreneurs who want to maximize success.

Her book ‘More Balls Than Most’ tells the story of her business life. In it she shares insights, wisdom and experiences to inspire young entrepreneurs, established business-people and chief executives alike.

For details of Company Shortcuts, her new business that helps companies in the accelerated growth stage, and ‘More Balls Than Most,’ visit: www.companyshortcuts.com

Leithal Thinking Presents is an initiative  to showcase people who are in the forefront of entrepreneurship and creative thinking.

This event is being hosted in partnership with Lister McDonald, who enable leaders and businesses to clarify what they want to cause, and empower them to make it a reality.

Please RSVP to avoid disappointment, spaces guaranteed to the first 50 responses only.

That’s essentially what’s in store for you in the next installment of our Fiery IRN-BRU online campaign. It’s a follow-up to the erudite old gentleman who were equally impressed by the fiery flavour (who’ve recently rocketed past 45k views on Youtube).

And if that doesn’t pep you up at midday on a cold Wednesday, we don’t know what will.

Thanks again to team Fiery, with an emphasis on Jordan and Dominique who wrote this little beauty.

We’ve developed a new campaign for Public Health Agency to raise awareness of good mental health. The campaign aims to highlight the early warning signs that could indicate a mental health issue and encourage people to seek help.

The ‘Under the surface’ multimedia public information campaign goes live today, World Mental Health Day, and will be carried in local press, on radio, TV, online and on the campaign website www.mindingyourhead.info.

The campaign message is that if you feel that your problems are getting on top of you, you can do something about it, like talking to someone you trust. Too often people are reluctant to seek help because there is still a degree of stigma attached to mental illness.

This campaign builds on the work we’ve been doing for the PHA over the last few years, including the award winning ‘Don’t cover up your problems’ campaign, to try and end this stigma and to get people to think about their mental health in the same way as physical health. Both are fundamental for a good quality of life.

As some of you may know IRN-BRU have gone and launched a brand spanking new limited edition product, Fiery IRN-BRU. It’s a blend of traditional IRN-BRU with ginger, chilli and pepper that packs a real punch.

In essence its regular IRN-BRU cranked up a notch, something that doesn’t happen every day, so it followed that our creative brief was to create advertising that would shout about the new product from the rooftops using every drop of the brand’s brave, bold and maverick attitude.

Led by the campaign idea “Watch Your Mouth” developed by Mikey and Mark you’ll be seeing the attached 6 sheets and phone kiosk wraps popping up all over the place from today. If you’re in Glasgow do look out for a couple of extra special bus shelter wraps in George Square and Renfrew Street (and if you’re feeling kind take a few snaps).

And while you’re online today have a look at this rather excellent wee film written by Jordan and Dominique. You’ll never look at your grandad the same way again…

M & Co, one of the largest privately-owned fashion retailers in the UK, with nearly 300 stores nationwide, recently chose us to create a new TV campaign for their autumn and Christmas collection.

Andrew McGeoch, Director of Marketing and Business Development at M&Co said: “We’ve been talking to a number of agencies about creating a new campaign to promote M&Co over the key trading periods of autumn and Christmas. Leith created some ideas and have produced 2 commercials that will give a fresh new feel to our brand and give us a distinct position versus our competitors.”

Ed Brooke, Head of Leith said: “We’re delighted to be working with M&Co. They are one of the enduring success stories of the high street and we’re hoping that the work we’ve produced for them will help propel more people through their doors than ever before”.

The 30 second Autumn collection ad launched yesterday. It was directed by Hamish Allison and produced by Freakworks, Edinburgh.

It’s rare we have a vacancy at Leith. Most of the time when people phone us up looking for a job we have to put on our polite voice and tell them we’re not really looking at the moment.

But things are different right now. Because we do have an opening. A proper, bona fide, spare-desk-and-a-swivel-chair vacancy in the ideas garden known as The Leith Agency Creative Department. In fact, we’ve got two of them.

If you’re a middleweight team, that means you’re an Art Director and Copywriter who’ve been doing ads and stuff for about at least three years (it’s nothing to do with Chris Eubank). So if you want to work on some spanking-good briefs, email us at middleweightjob@leith.co.uk 

If you’re good, we’ll be in touch. If not… well, we’ll probably be in touch anyway, just to say thanks. In our polite voice, of course.

We were recently asked by the Dean and Cauvin Trust to help them win a National Lottery Good Causes Award for their work with vulnerable young people in Edinburgh.

They originally started assisting orphans on the Royal Mile way back in 1733, and currently work to prevent homelessness and the dangers which go with it, helping vulnerable young people to live independently and happily.

To help them continue their brilliant work by winning Lottery funding, we produced this short film to help spread the word. We’d massively appreciate it if you could take 30 seconds to vote for them here and spread this video far and wide via social networks, email and carrier pigeons.

The video was inspired by the excellent 500 People in 100 Seconds, and features the doubly excellent So Much For Love, by Gramatik (free download here).