Leo Burnett Melbourne: Mumbrella Creative Agency Review – ‘Big brand boutique’ trumps Sydney office with Cannes win

The newly published Mumbrella Creative Agency Review examines Australia’s top 30 ad agencies. Today Robin Hicks examines how Leo Burnett Melbourne has fared over the last 12 months.

It is not easy having a sister agency in Sydney that is twice the size and many more times as famous. Leo Burnett Melbourne does not have a boss who has been on a top-rating TV show. Or one, for that matter, who has climbed Mount Everest. And it has not produced a campaign like Earth Hour. What a difference Cannes can make.

Leo Burnett Melbourne was one of only two Australian agencies to take home a grand prix from Cannes this year, for ‘See the person’ for Scope. This was followed by four golds at Spikes Asia, plus some exposure for the band in the ad, Rudely Interrupted, on Singaporean TV. Winning gold at the 2011 Effies for Sportsbet, while the Sydney office won no more than a silver, must have been extra satisfying for MD Melinda Geertz and her creative partner of six years, Jason Williams.

Not that the effervescent Geertz, a Burnett lifer, has ever seemed uncomfortable operating in the shadow of Todd Sampson’s Sydney office. Indeed her position as one of the few women on the board of the Communication Council is evidence enough that here is an executive prepared to put in the extra yards to boost the profile of the industry – and her own agency while so doing.