Boys and Girls joins global advertising network

Advertising firm Boys and Girls, which counts Three Mobile, Irish Distillers Pernod Ricard and Nissan among its clients, has joined Interpartners Communications, a global network of independent communications business.

The group, which says it was created “to make advertising travel more efficiently across borders”, comprises 26 agencies and has combined billings in excess of $620 million.

Its members believe that the application of advertising’s “big ideas” to international markets is “about interpretation, not simple language translation”.

They also espouse the belief that “ owners make careful drivers”, or that it is the originating agency of the “big idea” that is best placed to help it travel to other markets.

“Traditional holding company networks find it tough to motivate individual agencies executing global campaigns locally,” according to Interpartners.

Boys and Girls, founded “way back in 2009” as its website puts it, employs 43 people in Dublin and also has Digicel, Topaz, Danone, Dulux, RaboDirect, Britvic, Insurance Ireland and Brown Thomas on its roster.

"Increasingly, clients want to extend work we've created in the Irish market into wider European or global markets," says Boys and Girls managing partner Patrick Meade.

It’s a “nice challenge to have”, but “market-specific idiosyncrasies” mean global campaigns can get lost in translation.