Harris: 35 years young

And just like that, it’s December again and time to look back and take stock of the last 12 months. In a year that has seen us celebrate our milestone 35^th anniversary and a successful MBO by now joint managing directors Kirsty Scott and Neil Craven, we’ve pulled out all the stops for our clients and together navigated the challenges the last 12 months have thrown at us.

But before we set our sights on 2022, each team has taken time to reflect on their own highlights from this year.

 

Karla and Rose – social media

It’s been a busy year as we’ve delivered outstanding results for all of our existing clients month on month, as well as welcoming a host of new clients into the fold. Getting shortlisted at this year’s Construction Marketing Awards for ‘Best Social Media Campaign’ for one of our newest clients, Collard Group, demonstrates how quickly we can hit the ground running, taking everything in our stride to proactively develop successful campaigns.

Rose herself was shortlisted in the Emerging Agency Star of the Year category at the Construction Marketing Awards too. While as a team we also launched the first ever Harris Awards, which we designed to recognise the best independent Leeds businesses, and created a monthly newsletter, both of which have been great successes.

 

Emily and Lucy – design

For some reason lots of our clients have also been celebrating anniversaries this year too. This gave us an opportunity to create some really cool designs for our clients (and ourselves too) to mark their milestones. For Elite Systems, Washroom Washroom and Cre8 Joinery Solutions in particular we were given free rein and our designs went on to shape the look of the entire campaign.

For our long-standing client, Senior Architectural Systems, we’re currently working on a fun project designing its brand-new showroom. We’re looking after the whole design, even down to the wallpaper choice, and it’s been great to flex our creative muscles on a project like this.

 

Matt and Caroline – web and digital

We’ve undertaken more projects this year than ever before, in fact we’re currently in the process of hiring another developer to join our team in the new year as the demand for our services continues to grow.

And, as well as balancing lots of exciting projects this year, we’ve also developed a new internal system that helps the dev team start projects quicker, manage projects better and ultimately deliver better results for our clients. And to top off the year, we were proud to have been nominated in the ‘Best Use of Website’ category at the Construction Marketing awards for our work with the Future Transport Vision Group.

 

Mike – photography and video

When Jim stepped down as managing director at the beginning of 2021, I took over the majority of the photography and video projects, working across a broad range of clients and travelling up and down the country, getting out and about in all weathers. For Senior Architectural Systems’ project photography in particular, getting the perfect conditions with lighting and weather is challenging but it’s always a pleasure when the stars align!

Some of my personal highlights from this year were the Novus Paint Recycling video, which was a fun project to work on, and Elite Systems’ 30^th anniversary video. It was really refreshing to take a different approach to this style of video, steering clear of the more traditional corporate look and feel and the result really shows who Elite are as a company.

 

Faye, Liz and Amy – PR and content

This year has seen us working even closer with our colleagues in our social media, design, digital and photography departments as more companies recognise the benefits of working with a full-service agency. The multi-channel year-long campaign we’ve been working on with Sika specifically to support its passive fire protection range, is a good example of this in practice

And as well as working with several new clients who have joined us this year, we’ve also continued to work closely with our existing clients to deliver fresh ideas and engaging content for both print and online outlets. We were also delighted to support our returning client Novus Property Solutions with entries to this year’s Construction Marketing Awards which resulted in not one but two awards for the contractor.

We’ve all enjoyed being there for our clients this year, helping them shout loud and clear about all the great things they do day-in-day-out and of course celebrating their milestones and achievements too. We’re excited to see what fresh challenges 2022 will bring for us all!