Nielsen billings 2017: £54m (+27%)
Declared income: £6.2m
Total accounts at year end: 16
Accounts won: 8 (biggest: Yopa)
Accounts lost: 3 (biggest: Paddy Power)
Number of staff: 61 (+17%)
Key personnel: Helen Calcraft, founding partner; Andy Nairn, founding partner; Danny Brooke-Taylor, founding partner
Star player: Neelam Patel, accounts assistant
2017 started with a bang for Lucky Generals when the fierce little independent sold to TBWA\Worldwide. The shop now sits alongside TBWA\London as part of the TBWA UK Group, with Lucky Generals’ founders maintaining a significant minority stake in the business.
After that big move, life under the Omnicom umbrella quietened down. Business remained steady, with the agency claiming income growth of 51% during the course of the year. It won new clients including digital estate agent Yopa, smartphone manufacturer OnePlus, Nytol and Beck’s. On a global scale, Lucky Generals took on the task of bringing Budweiser’s Fifa 2018 World Cup sponsorship to life.
The end of the year took on a sour note with the loss of Paddy Power, the agency’s first client, which moved to Chime Sports Marketing. At the time, the betting company – which has had a revolving door of chief executives, marketing heads and agencies – said it would continue to work with Lucky Generals on sister brand Betfair, but in early 2018 that account headed for the door too.
Projects with Twitter and Radiocentre also came to an end.
There were still bright spots, most notably with Amazon, which has given the agency global scope since their relationship began in 2014. Lucky Generals got the chance to create the tech giant’s first worldwide holiday campaign and began work on its blockbuster Super Bowl 2018 ad featuring a host of celebrities filling in for Amazon Alexa.
Much like the diminutive French general Napoleon Bonaparte, from whom it takes its name, Lucky Generals holds on to its big ambition.
SCORE THIS YEAR |
SCORE LAST YEAR |
SELF RATING |
| 6 | 8 | 7 |
Agency's year in a tweet
Still lucky.
Score key: 9 Outstanding 8 Excellent 7 Good 6 Satisfactory 5 Adequate 4 Below average 3 Poor 2 A year to forget 1 Survival in question
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*indicates where agencies claim the corporate governance constraints of the Sarbanes-Oxley legislation
