Each year, strategy celebrates the brands that set themselves apart, those that not only built business success but also strengthened their connection with Canadians. These are our Brands of the Year (BOY).

Below are 2025’s winners and a snapshot of the accomplishments that made them BOY worthy. Full profiles will appear in the Fall 2025 issue of strategy, which will hit newsstands in the first week of November.

Strategy will also be celebrating the five brands’ success on Oct. 29 at Koerner Hall in Toronto, where each BOY will be honoured during the Agency of the Year gala.

For more information, visit strategy’s Agency of the Year website.

Clutch

Online car retailer Clutch has disrupted Canada’s used-car market by streamlining one of life’s biggest purchases. By setting its own ambitious set of quality standards, which include a 10-day money-back guarantee, the brand is on a trust-building crusade in a historically opaque category. With integrated campaigns across TV, OOH and digital, Clutch emphasizes ease, transparency and customer satisfaction. The result has been rapid growth, rising awareness and greater consumer confidence as Canadians increasingly embrace a simpler, more modern way to buy and sell cars.

Gruppo Terroni

From its proprietary olive oil to its hand-made pasta, Gruppo Terroni does everything according to authentic Italian tradition – except for its marketing, which is tech-forward, hyper-targeted, customized and optimized. The company has found a successful recipe for deeply integrating its many brands by creating a unified experience for customers, both online and in the real world, earning itself a devoted following along the way. An impressive evolution for a marketing department that started out eight years ago with a team of two and a blog post.

Kids Help Phone

Once known primarily as a crisis hotline, Kids Help Phone has rebuilt itself into a tech-enabled movement redefining how mental-health support reaches young people. In partnership with McCann, the organization shifted from answering calls to shaping culture, with “Feel Out Loud,” the country’s largest youth mental-health campaign, anchoring the evolution. Backed by partners such as Bell and BMO, the platform turned emotion into action and made “help” a national conversation. Behind the brand, KHP taps into millions of data points to map trends and close service gaps, while programs like Finding Hope, RiseUp and New Journeys keep equity and inclusion core to its growth. Recognized as one of Canada’s most trusted charities, Kids Help Phone proves that creativity, data and empathy can move a generation forward.

PWHL

In just two seasons, the Professional Women’s Hockey League (PWHL) has nearly doubled its league and team partnership portfolios, attracting the likes of Canadian Tire, Molson Coors, EA Sports, Barbie and Tim Hortons. The PWHL’s fanbase increased 52.2% year over year and has attracted more than 1.2 million attendees total since it began operations. Heading into its third season, the league is welcoming new teams in Vancouver and Seattle. The PHWL’s success is also turning heads outside of the sports world, topping the Harris Poll’s first-ever Canadian edition of its highly regarded Reputation Quotient.

Sleep Country Canada

One could say Sleep Country did not become the the number-one player in the Canadian mattress industry … overnight. The company has succeeded in a difficult retail space, in part by transforming its marketing. It’s done so by encouraging a more holistic and healthy approach to a good night’s rest through a lens of levity, helped by its newly minted “Sleep Daddy” brand spokesperson, Eugene Levy. After the the acquisitions of Endy, Hush, Silk & Snow and Casper’s Canadian assets, Sleep Country has thrived, carving out a cohesive vision for how each brand should operate, both individually and in relation to the parent company.