The New Wave ~ Curious Nation
The New Wave is Campaign Brief’s Q&A series spotlighting the next generation of independent creative companies and exploring how the indie model is evolving. From structure and speed to culture and capability, we unpack where these businesses are finding their edge and what’s driving client decisions today. Next up is Curious Nation.
1. Give us the elevator pitch – who are you and what do you do?
Curious Nation is a go-to activation partner for brands in Australia and New Zealand who want to stand out. We’re a friendly bunch of curious experts who create attention grabbing experiences that drive business growth across digital, retail and in the real world.
We thrive on discovery, and curiosity is our strategy. Everybody feels it, and it’s your best way of forging deeper connections with audiences. We’re all about curiosity. We’re all about growth. Curious Nation. Beyond the obvious.
2. Are indies still challengers, or have they become the norm?
Independent agencies have definitely become more mainstream, but the indie spirit has always been about being a challenger. It’s less about size or ownership structure and more about mindset.
We’ve always seen ourselves as challengers. Partly that’s because of the category we’ve grown up in. Brand activation and experiential has traditionally sat outside the established creative and media agency structures, so we’ve never really played by the conventional rules. We’ve built our business in both Australia and New Zealand by finding opportunities others weren’t looking at, connecting disciplines in different ways, and proving the value of ideas in the real world.
Being independent gives you the freedom to keep evolving, and that’s essential in today’s climate. The moment you get comfortable, you stop challenging yourself, your clients and the industry around you.
Even within the indie landscape, we still consider ourselves a challenger. As a female founded agency, we’re part of a very small minority (the stat that gets cited is that 1% of agencies are female founded). There are still relatively few agencies of our scale and longevity led by women, which gives us a unique perspective on leadership, culture and the kind of business we’re building.
So while independents may be more common than they once were, the challenger mindset never goes away. If anything, it’s the thing that defines what a great independent agency should be.
3. What’s your unfair advantage over the networks today?
It’s a combination of speed, entrepreneurialism and genuine care. Because we’re independent, we’re able to move quickly, make decisions fast and adapt as opportunities emerge without multiple layers of approval slowing things down.
But our biggest advantage is our mindset. We run our business on questions, not answers. Curiosity isn’t just a value, it’s how we work. We question everything, look beyond the obvious and never assume the established way is the best way. That helps us uncover opportunities others miss and create solutions that drive real commercial impact.
We’ve also grown up outside the traditional creative and media agency ecosystem. As an activation and experience-led business, we’ve always operated closer to the audience, where success is measured by how people respond, engage and act (experiential can be brutal if you don’t get the delivery right… no one wants people to side swerve you!). That keeps us commercially focused and grounded in what actually works.
Being project-based also creates a different level of accountability. Our success depends equally on building strong relationships and delivering results. Every brief matters, every project is earned, and that creates a culture of ownership, responsiveness and care that can be difficult to replicate at scale.
Ultimately, our unfair advantage is that we’re curious enough to keep challenging convention, agile enough to act on what we discover, and invested enough to care deeply about the outcome. That’s what allows us to consistently go beyond the obvious.
4. How are you using AI to compete above your weight?
The agencies that will win won’t be those with the best AI, but the ones that use AI to create more space for curiosity. We see technology as an enabler, but cultural change is the real opportunity. By combining AI’s speed with human curiosity, judgement and creativity, we’re building a more engaged team and delivering better outcomes for clients. That’s how we compete above our weight.
5. What kind of clients are choosing indies right now – and why?
All sizes. What’s interesting is that when we won a pitch recently for a sizeable FMCG brand, the client said to me Curious Nation are big enough to handle the size and volume of the work, but small enough for me to know I’m going to be working with leadership who are available and in the work. She wasn’t getting that from her previous networked agency.
6. What’s next – growth, staying lean, or something else?
The immediate focus is on realising the growth we’ve achieved over the last 12 months and continuing to build Curious Nation as both a business and a brand. We’re investing in our way of thinking, our culture and our capabilities, ensuring that what has got us here becomes an even stronger competitive advantage in the future.
We have never been motivated by being the biggest agency in the market. What excites us is the opportunity to build the most curious team in ANZ. Curiosity is at the heart of how we solve problems, uncover insights, challenge conventions and create better outcomes for clients. As the industry evolves, particularly with AI accelerating so much of the predictable work, curiosity, judgement and creativity become even more valuable differentiators.
For us the next chapter isn’t simply about growth or staying lean. It’s about building an organisation that continually learns, adapts and stays ahead by asking better questions than everyone else. And yes, there are a few exciting ideas whirling around that will help bring that ambition to life.
Check out the other New Wave Q&As below:
Read cummins&partners’ Q&A here
Read Connecting Plots Group’s Q&A here
Read Jacko Jacko & Jacko’s Q&A here
Read Chimera Project’s Q&A here
Read Today The Brave’s Q&A here
Read Tightknit Studio’s Q&A here
Read Bastion Australia’s Q&A here
Read We Are Different’s Q&A here
Read SICKDOGWOLFMAN’s Q&A here
Read Kill Boring Dead’s Q&A here
Read Oblong Creative’s Q&A here
Read The Many Australia’s Q&A here
Read Bureau of Everything’s Q&A here
Read Art of the Possible ANZ’s Q&A here
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