Agency Spotlight: Top Banana

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This article is brought to you in association with Macroart

Agency Spotlight, the latest addition to the Event Industry News site, profiles the top of the pyramid, the design and creativity behind brand activations, experiences, exhibition USPs and the greater live event model.

Sponsored by print specialist Macroart, these pages will profile agencies of all sizes, looking at how and why they started, with what ambition, key projects, relationships with the supply chain and a whole lot more besides.

If your agency has a fitting story to tell, get in touch: Kizzy@eventindustrynews.com 


Agency: Top Banana
Formed: 1999
Annual Events: 100+
Staff: 51-100
Offices: 2
Mantra: We bring strategy to life
top-b.com

Formation:

Top Banana was established back in 1999 by Nick Terry and Richard Bridge as a communications agency with the mission to help businesses communicate better. We do this through the creation and management of events and communications that excite, engage and deliver, allowing us to demonstrate a measurable difference.

Top Banana work closely with their clients to help them bring strategy to life by translating it into experiences and communications that generate real emotional engagement that connects the head and heart.

Since their first client in 1999 they now boast an impressive and enviable client portfolio which includes global brands such as Gucci, Whitbread, Virgin Media Business, Bentley, Costa and many more.

The business has grown over the last 20 years and is now one of the most reputable creative communications agencies in the industry, with a 50 strong team spread across two offices in London and the Midlands.

Now solely owned by Richard Bridge who is supported by the BLT (Banana Leadership Team), Top Banana is going from strength to strength and steadily growing in line with their ambitious five-year growth strategy.

CEO: Richard Bridge

As one of the co-founders of Top Banana, CEO Richard Bridge has travelled the world delivering projects for a stellar collection of well-known brands. His favourite experience, and potentially most impressive, was being the first agency to ever host an event in the Forbidden City.

Richard’s passion is to transform strategy into action and deliver creative solutions that create engagement and transform the organisation he works with…always working hard to push creative boundaries to create a measurable difference for his clients.

His infectious energy and endless passion for this industry as well as his curiosity for future industry trends and technology is what keeps us ahead of the game.

Key services and sectors served:

With their core mission to help businesses communicate better Top Banana work largely with internal communications teams helping them bring strategy to life through their 6 core services; events, incentives, digital, design, film and venue sourcing.

The agency work with a range of sectors from luxury, telecommunications and food and beverage to banking and insurance, automotive and retail.

Case Study: Virgin Media Business

Top Banana have been working with Virgin Media Business for three years and now help them with various elements of their events and communications strategy.

The company’s annual Sales Kick-off event is the opportunity to get the sales teams behind the strategy by outlining the objectives for the year, sharing financial statistics and motivating them to deliver. Working with the senior leadership team at VMB, five core objectives were agreed for the event centralising around recognition, reward, building confidence, improving engagement and assuring the sales teams had everything they needed to go in to the year and achieve success.

Top Banana created a truly immersive experience for the main plenary room, using a 360-degree screen set up and central stage, encompassing the event theme of “We Are VMB”. A carefully crafted agenda was created, using a balance of engaging plenary and lively break-out sessions on both days to give the event a good rhythm and flow. Delegates celebrated in style at the evening awards ceremony followed by a winter wonderland themed dinner and after party.

Post-event feedback saw that 97% of delegates rated the event as good or simply brilliant This is an incredible 34.5% increase from the 2016 event and a 2% increase from our Limitless event in 2017.

“Top Banana absolutely nailed it. A dream to work with, coming up with creative solutions to problems on the way, a number of our leaders have said it felt like the “most joined up we have ever been” and the best sales conference yet.” Karin Weaver, Head of Internal Communications, VMB.

What the future holds

2019 marks a big milestone for Top Banana as they will be celebrating their 20th anniversary with their employees, clients and fellow industry professionals.

The success of our business is all down to Top Banana’s amazing team; therefore, they are always looking out for new top talent to help deliver client projects and will continue to do this this as part of their five-year growth strategy. To support this growth, Top Banana are also open to expanding their global presence by opening further offices both in the UK and overseas. As their global presence is strengthening and the team are spending more and more time overseas it’s a natural and exciting progression for the agency.


This Agency Spotlight is sponsored by Macroart

Macroart challenges the assumptions about a ‘typical print company’. With a fair bit of cool kit to turn clients’ visions into reality, Macroart’s enthusiastic, committed and talented team delivers some of the most complex print projects in live events, retail and interiors.

Adam Parry
Author: Adam Parry

Adam is the co-founder and editor of www.eventindustrynews.com Adam, a technology evangelist also organises Event Tech Live, Europe’s only show dedicated to event technology and the Event Technology Awards. Both events take place in November, London.