“We believe in the underdog. It's a great feeling to help our clients get a piece of the big guy’s action and we’re constantly telling them that great advertising makes selling easier,” Brendan Buckley, managing director, Impact Media, says as he casually sits back in a leather seat in the Merrion Hotel in Dublin before taking a sip of his cappucino.

On a break from shooting a commercial for Supermac’s in Screenscene, Buckley commutes regularly between Galway and Dublin. Well used to travelling interstate from his days working in the US with the Irish Pub Company and Fado, he hopes that he will be making many more trips across the midlands to see new clients this year.

Buckley had two motives for moving to Galway. He felt the lifestyle in the West would be better. His career at Irish Distillers had reached a point where his mid-management role could go no further. For some time, he had yearned to “do his own thing”. His wife, who worked with a leading pharmaceutical firm, was thinking along similar lines.

So last year, he looked around. Galway caught his eye and as Impact Media is the main player in the city’s agency services, an informal introduction by way of an acquaintance was made with the agency’s directors. They met up and both agreed that given the agency’s contacts in Galway and Buckley’s FMCG background, they should team up.

“Tom Lynskey and Niall McGarry have done a great job in building up the agency from a small acorn to a sizeable business,” Buckley said. “But they recognised they got it to a certain level and they wanted to take some new steps – and that’s where I came in.”

Lynskey, now financial director and McGarry, chairman, knew about design, advertising and media and after leaving university they sold space in newspapers. During their time with the Galway Independent freesheet, they noticed the amount of ad spend locally.

‘Great ideas don’t cost the world. Thankfully, we don’t cost the world either’ – Brendan Buckley

Ads were being placed in large numbers in the Galway Advertiser, Mayo News and Limerick Leader, with little or no real thought behind them. They saw an opportunity for advertising services locally and Impact Media was founded to fill the gap in 2003.

Two years later they threw a big party in the city’s Harbour Hotel at which they spoke about progress and launched a brand revamp of the agency. Impact Media’s new slogan became ‘We work beyond’ which has since been reworked to read ‘Incisive, insightful and inspirational’. That’s the message one will find when clicking on the agency site.

The emphasis has always been on retail and services. Last year the agency sought someone with a strategic background who could knock on bigger doors. Buckley had spent six years with Pernod Ricard’s IDL and knew about account and brand planning.

“Last time I checked,” Buckley said, “you couldn’t get a degree in creativity. Perhaps it’s a Galway thing but we’re continuously trying to think of original and creative ways by which we can tug on the coat of our consumers and persuade them to buy.

“Our job now is to knock on the doors of our consumers and get invited in. People tend to avoid advertising these days which puts us in a bit of a hole – and it’s everywhere. So you have to believe in the power of an arresting, disruptive idea. We’re on the look out for genuine insights which will make the ideas we come up with engaging and relevant.”

Impact Media’s national clients include Simply Mortgages, Elvery Sports, Supermac’s, McInerney Homes and Pat McDonnell Paints. While up to now they have tended to leave bigger fry like Boston Scientific to Dublin agencies, Buckley would not now rule out trawling in deeper waters as part of his efforts to grow the business.

Regional and local clients include the Radisson SAS, Dromoland Castle, McDonogh DIY and homeware, Floorworld, Galway Business School, Louis Copeland, Lydon House and the Dog Company, where pet owners can rely on “John Madden’s essential canine care”.

On the media buying and planning side, Impact uses Vizeum, an agency which Buckley would have dealt with on a number of drinks brands during his time at IDL. He does not wish to model the business on any particular agency but specialist and niche fit the bill.

“There wouldn’t be any agency as such that comes to mind for me to say ‘yeah, I’d like for us to be like them’ but I’d like Impact to be seen as capable of producing good creative work at cost-effective rates. We don’t have the overheads they have in Dublin.”

As a client, while he enjoyed working with the bigger agencies, he felt there was a share of mind issue. At IDL, for a rebrand of West Coast Cooler he deliberately put together a list of small agencies which subscribed to challenger branding.

Impact Media is in fact the trading name of Creative Thinking Limited. Buckley might avoid point to the ethos that big fish eat small fish but rather highlight what Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer once said that “fast fish eat slow fish”. Think big, act glocal.

Bloom (see cover story, Marketing, April 2007) won the WCC pitch and it is an agency he came to admire. Of the bigger Irish agencies he admires, McConnells would stand out most. He was in Dublin recently to attend John Fanning’s farewell party in the Shelbourne where Fanning’s beloved Irish poetry and QPR made for a lively event.

STRIP TEASE A recent press campaign which Impact Media created for Pat McDonnell Paints, where the message reads: ‘Make your home a masterpiece with wallpaper’

Aside from advertising and design, Impact Media also offers web design and public relations and they are currently looking to recruit a PR director. Buckley refers to line attributed to US advertising legend Pat Fallon: “It’s better to outsmart than outspend”.

Hiring good staff is always an issue but given that the agency is in Galway, the problem tends to be compounded. The ‘Look West’ initiative is helping to change things and Buckley points out that his move to Galway is itself an example of this.

The creative team, which is steered by Andy Ainley, come “from all over the place”, a lot of visual arts people. Mary O’Malley is a senior graphic designer who has been with the agency for a number of years and Lucy Meehan and Elizabeth Lenihan are ‘suits’.

Recruitment is on the agenda for this year and given the work-life balance which living and working in Galway offers, Buckley does not forsee any great difficulties with account managers basically acting as the marketing ‘department’ for local clients.

Impact Media is undergoing a brand audit so the agency name may well adopt a more catchy title. The business shows no signs of slowing down and now employs 15 staff. To accommodate the growth, the agency is moving nearby to a new 6,500 square foot premises which has been built in Oranmore Business Park over the past five months.

Buckley is happy with life in Galway. The cosmopolitan feel of the city and the constant shuffle of tourists and students is music to his ears. Home is Athenry and given his long-held affection for Liverpool Football Club, the new location feels appropriate. Being in the right place is one thing, being among the main players demands luck, sweat and tears.