Eight celebrates 10 year milestone with launch of its Meridian campaign via The Monkeys, Aotearoa

Australasian production company, Eight, this week celebrates its 10 year anniversary of launch into the NZ market with the newly released Meridian Energy campaign.

Directed by award-winning Jamie Lawrence and produced by Claire Kelly, The Meridian Energy campaign features Nature, a strong female character that embodies everything Eight has set out to do since its inception.

Founded in Sydney, Australia by Mike Vanderfield in 1998, Eight’s managing director Katie Millington took the plunge and moved to New Zealand to launch the NZ office in April 2012.

Vanderfield said it himself, that proudly these days Eight is all about the women and the gays, who’d have thunk it?

In celebration of its 10 year milestone, Eight has been looking back on achievements and partnerships along the way. Ten years on, Eight is proud to be a women-led organisation from the top down with 100% of executive and administrative roles being held by women and their directing roster that is edging close to being 50/50 male and female. Eight has a strong commitment to diversity and to achieving equality on set. Eight also works closely with Eight director Miki Magasiva and Mario Gaoa from The Brown Factory to achieve their goal of getting more brown faces on screen. In 2020 Eight launched The Story Department and currently has four long form projects in the works including The Dame Valerie Adams feature documentary, More than Gold.

With over 40 nominations and wins at the Axis Awards since its NZ inception, Eight has aligned itself with talented agencies across the industry to deliver iconic campaigns such as Tui Beer Plumber, Rainbow Youth’s ‘If it’s not gay, it’s not gay’, and the Air NZ Hobbit Safety Video.

Says Millington: “When I moved to NZ on a wing and a prayer, I had high hopes for building the kind of production company I wanted to work at. I wanted to build a creative space for artists with a supportive family vibe, where women lift other women up. I’m proud to say we’ve achieved this in spades. I’ve been nostalgic over the past few months thinking about all the personalities, the artists and technicians through our doors over the last decade and I’m thankful to each and every one of them for being part of the Eight narrative, for a reason or a season. Celebrating this milestone with the launch of the Meridian Energy campaign is the icing on our 10th birthday cake.”

Following recognition as a finalist for the Diversity Award at the 2021 B&T Awards, Eight NZ pledges to strive for a workplace that reflects the community in which it lives, and to continue to uplift and unveil new vibrant talent into this next decade, Eight would like to thank all those like-minded individuals and companies who have partnered with them since 2012 including the incredible The Monkeys Aotearoa on this most recent campaign.

(Pictured from top, left to right: Charlotte Evans, Florence Noble, Chamolie Thomson, Becks Lawrence, Jamie Lawrence, Katie Millington, Claire Kelly, Steve Saussey, Josh Frizzell, Nika Januszkiewicz, Miki Magasiva, Dan Max)