Invercargill Marketing Company Taking On The Big Boys

A small marketing company in Invercargill proved it has what it takes to play with the big boys. On 7 August, 2019, The Designers Institute of New Zealand named Back9 Creative Studio a finalist for the prestigious Best Design Awards in the Ngā Aho category.

The national award recognises designs that reflect New Zealand’s indigenous culture, heritage, and sense of place with an emphasis on cross-culture collaboration between designers and the clients.

The awards cover 9 disciplines and 50 categories, and candidates from all over the country submitted their designs for the contest. A small group of finalists were chosen, and the winners will be announced at the awards dinner on 4 October 2019 in Auckland.

“It feels pretty amazing to be in the finals to be honest.” Says Phil Robinson, Founder and Creative Director at Back9. “The project has been a truly collaborative effort with all of us in the studio being involved on some level, and we’ve had great interactions with the Mīharo team and their board.”

Back9 is the only Southland company to be a finalist for both the Ngā Aho Awardand the 2019 Best Design Awards in general.

“There’s so much talent and potential in Southland.” Phil stated. “We want to do our part to promote that and show that you don’t have to be from a big city to do great work.”

Back9 has seen extensive growth in the last few years and has recently added an in-house photographer and a copywriter and is on the lookout to hire another designer. Their new website, back9.co.nz was launched in May 2019 and has significantly increased traffic to the studio. The team hopes that being a finalist for the Ngā Aho Award will have a similar effect and will showcase the talents and abilities of everyone at the studio.