Goodbye old office

We’re moving. You’ll know this if you’ve happened past 14 Pembroke Road over the past few weeks. You can’t have avoided the sign outside our gate that excitedly reads SOLD!!! (we can stop our copywriters from using exclamation marks, but not it would appear McNally Handy). Moving always causes mixed emotions. Yes we have a great new building to go to (more on this soon) and yes it is mathematically possible that it will be ready on time, if not on budget, but this building is special. This building is where we started.

This is the building that we walked into five years ago and wondered how we would ever fill it. This is where we hung a temporary sign beside the front door (the one that’s still there to this day). This is where Patrick and I sanded the floors while we waited for business to pour in, where Fiona assembled Ikea furniture, Chris baked scones, where Margaret cleaned and where Pat cultivated French Hair.

Zut Alors

It’s where we promised to drink wine on Fridays and to light fires when it got cold (neither lasted). It is also where we swore that we’d have to rent out the basement, but that we’d wait until next month to do it. Where we thought a Lego boardroom table might be a wheeze and where I floated the idea of a reception desk held up by balloons.

This is where great people came for interview and agreed to join our agency, where clients and prospective clients came to be wowed (though one was so unmoved that he fell asleep mid-pitch – unsurprisingly we didn’t win that one)

Six people walked in the door of this fine building, and next week 34 of us will head over to Portobello to make a new home. We’re excited, but a little bit nervous. Because whatever we construct in Portobello, we built a business here.