After 5+ years in Australia Republic of Everyone creative director Ben Akers set to return to the UK

CB Exclusive – Ben Akers, creative director of Sustainable and Ethical Comms agency Republic of Everyone and his wife, Claire Wilkinson, associate producer at Jungleboys, are returning home to England after 5 1/2 years in Sydney.

Akers, who joined Droga5 Australia in its infancy, before Joining GPY&R and then RoE, is noted for Vanilla Ice says “Sorry,” 4320LA, Signed Finds, MSF.TV, Greenpeace “Birds” and “The Hot Potato.”

While Wilkinson was part of the team that brought the world the ABC shows “The Elegant Gentleman’s Guide to Knife Fighting” and “The Moodys”.

Says Akers: “We have made an enormous amount of friends in Sydney and had an amazing time but it’s definitely right to go home now  – particularly so our daughter can get to know her family.

“I just want to say a huge thanks to everyone we’ve worked with and become friends with along the way, especially Nobby who brought us across to Oz in the first place, Julian Watt who I learnt a lot from and a special thanks to Ben Peacock and Scott Matyus-Flynn who re-energized my belief in creativity and let me have so much fun trying to help the planet at RoE. I also want to say a big thanks to Will Alexander, EP/Founder of Heckler – for always being open to whatever crazy idea or budget I had; ‘Where there’s a Wilba, there’s a way’,”  says Akers.

“Bakers” as he’s been re-named in Sydney – has just represented Republic of Everyone and Australia as a White Pencil judge at this year’s D&AD 2014. He now passes on the CD baton at RoE to Giles Kershaw, the current head of design.

“Giles has been a big part of every piece of work that’s come out of Republic of Everyone since I’ve been here” say Akers. “He doesn’t need luck, awesome people like him create their own luck.”

Says Scott Matyus-Flynn, partner and head of strategy at Republic of Everyone: “Bakers had been a stellar creative for a long time so we were chuffed he wanted to work with us. Getting people excited about ‘doing the right thing’ or ‘ethics’ is a tough gig, but when you’ve got as much creative energy as he has, you can just about make anything happen – even a hot potato tour.  A lot of the attention and recognition for the creative work we do is because of him – he’s definitely got big boots to fill.  But luckily for us, Giles is integral to our creativity – and he also has big feet.”