Never fear, there’s a First-Aider near!...

When it was decreed that in order for us to keep on top of our Health and Safety responsibilities, our first-aiders needed an informational "top-up" no one jumped for joy! Nonetheless, in March, Anna, Dan and Simon J were sent back to college to become students for a day.

Anna's week in pictures

Ever wondered what do the Idealogy team get up to on a daily basis? Well here's 'the evidence' and a sneaky peek at the weekend too. Nothing too incriminating (yet!)

Anna Ecuyer - My Top 3 Websites

The web space we're invading!
Just some sites that Idealogy people are visiting that tick their boxes.

Anna Ecuyer - Creative Services Manager

http://pinterest.com/
My new obsession - a great digital scrap book to collect ideas, inspiration and images.

http://maps.google.co.uk/
Be honest where would we be without it.

http://www.boredpanda.com/
interesting design and art.

Posted by Idealogy

The Walk the Walk London Moonwalk 2011 - one night, one very good cause and a great sense of achievement

After a pasta picnic for 14,000, some very funny warm ups and a minutes silence all hand in hand, we set off on our 26.2 mile walk through London. Here we were again having first completed it back in 2008, it couldn’t be that tough… could it?

We left the Moonwalk tent at 23.40 and set our pace. There was a real party atmosphere, lots of chatter and nervous laughter and the first few miles went by in a flash. In no time we had passed Buckingham Palace, gone on up through Hyde Park Corner and St James Park and were heading for the Victoria Embankment.

Drifting in for a pint at the local

Now here’s dangerous ground!  Mess with local tradition and it will drive you to drink!

Take a bastion of community life, a pub with huge local heritage and loyalty, named in a way that really does ‘do exactly what it says on the tin!”  Surround it with a centuries old regional custom, then try to persuade the new owners, the staff and the locals to change the name and refresh the customer experience.

As easy as falling off a horse? Not really…but a really brave project for all concerned; the only real trick we needed to pull off was to get it to work in the hearts and minds of all involved. So, with all that background, Idealogy’s Head of Client Services, Anna Ecuyer, set off to talk ‘rebrand’ to New Forest Hotels, the owners of The Beaulieu Road Inn, a local hostelry in the grounds of their Beaulieu Hotel, and a focus for New Forest life for many, many years. To quote one of the staff, “It’s obvious where it is, even if you don’t know the area”. It’s hard to argue with that kind of logic…but argue we did!

Following meetings with New Forest Hotel’s marketing team and an extensive round of local research, Idealogy found their ‘pewter mug’. The Beaulieu Road, and in particular the Beaulieu Road Railway Station, had for centuries been the focus of the New Forest Drift – the round up of local ponies to be wormed (ugh!), branded, tailed and often auctioned. Commoners who live within the bounds of the Forest own all the ponies and ownership rights are jealously guarded; passed down through generations of families. Then we discovered what we thought were a number of New Forest Pub Bands. The Agisters, who organise The Drift, and The Verderers, who employ The Agisters and who have complete control of all the stallions in the New Forest. At this point, we were in danger of uncovering a new episode from Lord Of The Rings, so we drew a line under the local history and turned for further insight to the local Beaulieu Road Inn patrons and the people responsible for managing the customer experience – the Pub staff.

And, as you’d expect, at first we met fairly stiff resistance to any form of change. Our joint research gave us some interesting options, including a proposed name change to The Drift Inn – simple, evocative and a perfect way to breathe new life and appeal into a hidden gem of the regional experience. 

Well, they said yes and a significant re-brand followed! Today, the Drift Inn team are responsible for bringing their new brand, newly refurbished pub (and menu) and indeed the experience itself to life, telling the story of The Drift and creating the atmosphere for patrons who, for so long, have been supporters of a regional stronghold.

Now that’s worth a glass of Old Thumper, don’t you think?

Cheers.

Posted by Anna Ecuyer

Analog or digital? Left or right side of the brain? Town-y or country girl? Anna keeps us all on our toes...

How well do any of us really know Anna Ecuyer, Idealogy’s very own Bristolian?

The story so far - Anna joined us from a local PR and Design Agency, but prior to that, the greater part of her career was forged on the London Agency circuit. So, nothing the provinces could throw at her was going to be tougher than that experience.

When her husband Toby landed the key role as Creative Director at a leading super yacht, luxury motor and sailing yacht design consultancy, Anna didn’t think twice about changing to a life by the sea or, for that matter, committing herself to her career with an out-of-town consultancy – and that was where her (to date) 6 year relationship with Idealogy began, progressing from her initial role as Senior Designer, to Client Services Manager, through to her role today as Key Account Manager, handling the relationships and account services for many of Idealogy’s leading B2C Clients.

So what does she find so engaging about her work at Idealogy? Well, in her words, it was “the first time I really felt the ‘benefit’ of leaving London and the change of lifestyle.” And this highlights the most valuable characteristic about Anna’s approach to her work –achieving a sustainable work/life balance. She works fantastically hard, and is one of the most, if not the most, diligent worker in the business. But ask her and she’ll say, ‘I work like this because I value the time I get to spend by the sea, in the forest, with my boy, walking Polly (her beautiful Hungarian Vizsla, and now the Company dog), doing interior decorations, and, of course, gardening’.

So, actually, we do know an awful lot about Anna, and, by return, she knows an awful lot about her colleagues – which is another thing she finds intriguing, compelling and, lets say it, bizarre about Idelaogy. It feels like working alongside nutty uncles, older brothers and strange, twice removed cousins. So, it’s a dysfunctional yet highly individual family. But what she revels in is her own space, within her hectic working and social lifestyle, to watch good movies by the fireside, to try to read lots of books and to get back to her piano playing roots.

For those of us who think we know her, theres a lot of stuff we possibly don’t realise – and that’s a good thing; a constituent part of keeping a balance and keeping a distance. “Work is great, but life is so much better…”

Yep! She’s going to continue to keep us all guessing!

Posted by Simon Dover

20 years old. So why do we have an Anniversary crisis to cope with?

Typical!

It didn’t escape our notice that, as we approached our 20th birthday in August, we had a few difficult decisions to take. Which I suppose, as adults, shouldn’t present too many problems but it has become symptomatic of a life spent in a shifting landscape, ducking and diving, trying to flesh out an approachable personality and identity.

And that’s hard for a small business, especially one that opened as Selling Ideas the very day the headline read “it’s official, we’re in a recession”. There’s a beguiling symmetry there don’t you think?

Back in 1989, we could have been accused of recklessness, and indeed, the early years were tough as we learned to balance the rigours of running the new Selling Ideas business, with the needs of a demanding client base. But we soldiered on and we grew, putting on weight and muscle in all the right areas, developing our vocabulary, learning how to walk confidently amongst our peers. The family album had lots of attractive portraits and group pictures as we gazed, clear eyed, beside our friends and colleagues, at the flashing bulb.

We were standing tall and learning how to work well and play with others. And we were becoming independent.

But, like all adolescents, we weren’t 100% sure of who we really were. Life was so much easier in the early days, when all anyone wanted to talk about was good ideas, and we had plenty of those to sell.

With maturity comes a fresh set of beliefs and intellectual fog. We weren’t afraid of the questions we were being asked or where those questions came from – and our world had clearly become a more consumerist and commercial place. What we were scared of was our ability to consistently come up with the right answers – because that meant we had become something else, something quite different from the persona we knew and had grown comfortable, arguably too comfortable, with. Idealogy had become a comprehensive vision.

So we changed, and in all honesty, we’ll continue to adapt as the world changes around us. Today’s incarnation as Idealogy may be quite different again in another 5 years, but that’s life and, as we all know, change is good!

Now, back to the crisis!

Is a 20th anniversary a China or a Platinum, because that will make a huge difference to the party theme? Are we going to drink tea from a saucer or are we all going to show up in blonde wigs? Decisions, decisions…….

Answers and comments please.

Posted by Idealogy