Drugi jezik na kojem je dostupan ovaj članak: Bosnian
By: Marina Čulić Fischer, DIALOG Communications and PROXIMITY Zagreb, BBDO Group Croatia
I am writing this letter just after the big 25th anniversary celebration of the agency BBDO Zagreb, and 15 years of the agency DIALOG Communication.
A lot of wonderful people gathered to raise a glass not only to our health, but also to good, past times and to an unknown but, I believe, great future.
BBDO Zagreb was established as one of the first international agencies in the region in 1990. It was a year of great changes in the world and the year that preceded the dramatic changes in the former Yugoslavia. A few years later, in the political sense, nothing was the same anymore, and today everything is different, including in the industry in which we have worked for so long.
25 years ago we dealt mostly with marketing. Today, we deal with communication, and we speak with our customers every day through dozens of different channels. 25 years ago any decent campaign included a marketing mix that consisted of advertisements in newspapers, on television, on radio, on leaflets and posters. Today, television is a luxury, the press rarely makes its way into media plans, outdoor advertising is in decline, investment in radio is only slightly increasing (*data from HURA for Croatia), and the internet is developing at warp speed, showing no signs of an end. Public relations were the star at the beginning of the century, today they are transforming and struggle for their place in communications budgets.
Only a few agencies in this region can boast 25 years of continuity, without a single unpaid supplier, with all obligations settled to the last cent, with a nice armful of awards and a clean slate.
A series of brilliant people who are now active in other areas have grown out of BBDO, or through cooperation with BBDO – Siniša Waldinger, Damir Brčić, Davor Bruketa, Nikola Žinić, Dunja Bua, Boris Belak, Krešimir Purgar, Veljko Žvan, Tomislav Presečki, Anamarija Horaček –to name just a few who have built their reputation in the agency business.
To celebrate our first quarter of a century, our Chief Creative Officer Almir Okanović has designed, filmed and directed a nine-minute video in which seven minutes are devoted to our award-winning work and thanking our clients, production teams, mom, dad and associates, and then, in the eighth minute, the faces begin to change to the people who invested their lives in this great story of ours. And then you realize that all the awards, all the budgets, all the recognition is not as important as the people who make the team. Not only those who have left and made or continue to make successful careers, but most of all the people on whom you can rely every day. People who have your back and who are there with you to celebrate the victories, and share the defeats. Remember that. And don’t miss the chance to celebrate with them each year you have lived together, even if you haven’t yet reached 25.