Having lost strategy’s Agency of the Year crown in November, which ended an enviable four-year reign, this honour may help fill the void. (A 14th place ranking in the 2006 Gunn Report – a first for a Canadian-founded agency – is likely helping as well.)
In our Canadian version of the Gunn, Taxi’s inaugural first-place finish was buoyed by international wins for clients Mini Canada and Pfizer at Cannes and The One Show, which allowed the agency to finally snatch the title from nine-year champ DDB Canada.
In addition to the award show hauls, 2006 also saw the Montreal-based shop open more offices (Vancouver and Taxi 2, a second Toronto office), score new clients (Molson Canadian and Discount Car Rentals), and hire top talent (including John Berg from Bulldog NY as president of Taxi NY).
So what does ’07 hold? ‘I’m looking forward to shaking things up a little,’ says VP/ECD Zak Mroueh. ‘Right now, we’re developing our first music video for a band which is very cool. We’ll also be doing the branding.’
‘It’s going to be an exciting year,’ he adds. ‘With six offices, we are now officially a network, but not in the traditional sense. We get to control our own destiny.’
THE RANKING
TAXI 380
DDB Canada 365
Rethink 340
Leo Burnett Canada 177
zig 127
BBDO Canada 84
john st. 62
TBWA 62
Lowe Roche Advertising 56
MacLaren McCann 43
Bos 40
Diesel 38
Target Marketing and Communications 37
Bensimon Byrne 35
JWT 35
Extreme Group 29
Ogilvy & Mather 29
Foote, Cone and Belding 28
Dentsu Canada 27
Publicis 27
Downtown Partners DDB 21
Cossette Communication (Cossette Atlantic) 18
Holmes and Lee 18
Arnold Worldwide 17
Saatch & Saatchi Advertising 16
ACLC 13
GJP Advertising 13
Trigger Communications & Design 12
Alfred 11
Wasserman & Partners Advertising 10
Y&R 10
Doug Agency 8
Rare Method 8
AMW 7
Due North Communications 7
Highwood Communications 7
Pirate Radio & Television 7
Astral Media 6
Grey Worldwide 6
lg2 6
LXB Communication Marketing 6
Ogilvy Canada 6
Round Table Advertising 5
Saint-Jacques Vallee Young & Rubicam 5
Attik 4
Discovery Channel Canada 4
Dory Advertising 4
Goodgoll Vendramin 4
Headspace Marketing 4
Jan Kelly Marketing 4
The Gem Group 4
WAX 4
Colour 3
Ogilvy 3
4stroke 2
Allard Johnson Communications 2
Calder Bateman Communications 2
Cinematics Studios 2
Jason Sweet Photo Ilustration 2
Marketel 2
orangetango 2
St. Joseph Media 2
The Brainstorm Group 2
AdFarm 1
Bristol 1
Brown Communications Group Inc 1
Hanger 10 Creative Group 1
Hot Tomali 1
Porkpie Hat 1
Urban Orange 1
Zero Gravity 1
