Branding and Creativity: 5 Key Takeaways
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In 2017, one of our interns at Huddle wrote a blog post on their last day about the creative lessons they were taking away from 12 weeks with the team. Looking back at it, it's remarkable how well the five principles they identified hold up — not just as reflections on a summer internship, but as a genuine summary of the creative philosophy that guides our client work.
Here are those five principles, revisited with the perspective of a few more years' worth of brand projects.
1. Good ideas can come from anywhere
One of Huddle's strengths is the unique way the team collaborates. Projects feed the energy of the whole team. Folks from new business, marketing, finance, or HR can all gather around a screen and critique as one team, and there is strength in this. The best inspiration for a project can come from the most obscure place or the quietest team member. A respectful ear and an open mind has led to beautiful, sound work for our clients.
This is still true, and it matters for clients as much as for agencies. The best brand briefs we've received have come from conversations — not from completed documents. When a founding partner says something unscripted about why they started their firm, that's often the brand story. When a junior fee-earner articulates why a client chose them over a larger competitor, that's often the positioning.
The implication: don't limit brand discovery to the marketing team or the partners. Talk to the people who do the work and listen to the people who chose you. The ideas are already there.
2. Diversity is the key to beautiful work
I've met people from all over in this office: Londoners, Northerners, Israelis, and Lithuanians. Every day I could bring unique personal things to creative meetings, and enjoy the personal learnings of others. The brilliant and effective thing is that we have both when we exist together.
In brand work, diversity of perspective matters in a specific way: it prevents the insular thinking that causes brands to talk to themselves rather than their clients. When everyone in the room has the same background, the same vocabulary, and the same reference points, the brand tends to reflect that — competent but narrow.
The best brand identities we've developed at Huddle have come from processes that deliberately included diverse voices: not just the leadership team, but clients, prospective clients, junior staff, and occasionally people outside the industry entirely. The AvaTrade Be More Bolt campaign — integrating the world of athletics with the world of online trading — is a good example of what happens when you stop assuming your audience thinks like you.
3. Stick to your guns
The variables in any one project could be endless — time, budgets, talent, desire, competition, red tape. Regardless, the goal is always to bring the best work possible to life.
Amid edits and criticism, beautiful work must be defended — and for good reason. It's in our clients' best interest to defend good design. It's their reputation on the line and we owe them honesty to encourage better business.
The version of this that matters most in practice: being willing to tell a client when a direction won't work, even when they're enthusiastic about it. The most valuable thing a branding partner can do is not deliver what's asked — it's deliver what's right.
When we worked with Hope & Homes for Children on their brand transformation, the instinct in some parts of the organisation was toward safety — imagery that felt familiar for a charity, language that didn't challenge too much. The brand that emerged was bolder and more specific. It takes real conviction to get there, from both sides of the table.
4. Pressure makes diamonds
At any agency, the deadlines and work can pile up quickly all at once. It reinforced a lesson: go with your gut. Choosing what inherently feels right for your brand ultimately is the direction you need to go. The pressure (when properly applied) can lead a team to victory.
There's something to this that sounds counterintuitive: constraints improve creative outcomes more often than they hinder them. An unlimited budget and an open brief rarely produce the best work. A tight timeline, a clear audience, and a specific problem to solve — those conditions produce decisions.
For clients, this means something practical: the best way to get great brand work is not to leave everything open. Come with a clear sense of what you're trying to achieve commercially, who you're trying to reach, and what's not working about the current brand. The constraints help.
5. Love what you do and do it well
This is probably the lesson I learned most deeply. These people love what they do, and they do a kick-ass job of it. Creating is a strength and passion for each of these individuals, which made the perfect environment to grow and ask questions. Loving the things I do, and striving to be the best at them, will be a mantra that follows me outside of the workplace.
We agree with this completely — and it shows in the work. The brands that perform best for our clients are those where the Huddle team is genuinely invested in the outcome. Where we believe in the brief, where the strategy excites us, where we care about whether it works.
If you want to work with a team that takes that approach — and you're ready to have an honest conversation about what your brand could be — start with the Blandscape™ audit or brief us directly.