6
1975
Manchester, NH and Boston, Mass. (USA)
Integrated Agency (Strategy, Creative, Media, Production)
64
Weirdo
We proudly claim Weirdo because, at GYK, an integrated creative agency based in Manchester, NH, and Boston, MA, operating a little “left of center” is just how we roll. Our agency was built in the spirit of New Hampshire’s “live free or die” mentality — fiercely independent, unapologetically entrepreneurial, and always on a mission to innovate and be one step ahead. Many of our people *legitimately fled* the biggest holding company agencies in New England or world-class brands to join our indie shop because they wanted something different: a people-first place where curiosity is rewarded, senior leaders roll up their sleeves, and the team has the freedom to do what it takes to move our clients’ brands and businesses forward.
Our Creative Growth engine comprises 64 creative entrepreneurs, modern storytellers, Emmy-award-winning makers, and data-driven problem solvers who believe creativity is a strategic lever for growth and would rather break things than go by the book. To us, autopilot is the enemy — the enemy of growth, the enemy of standing out, the enemy of winning in the marketplace. Clients don’t come to GYK to maintain the status quo; they come to us because we question assumptions and come up with creative solutions that work harder, deliver impact, and help brands punch above their weight class. Call us weird … but that’s exactly how we’ve helped Ken’s Foods, Cedar’s Hummus, and other clients compete against category giants like Kraft and PepsiCo-owned Sabra, at a fraction of the spend.
Here are a few “rules” we’ve happily broken:
We treat independence as an asset and flex our model as we see fit. Free from the constraints of holding company red tape, we’re able to make decisions and move faster, shape offerings around client needs, and adapt our model to the quickly changing marketing landscape. With core strategy, media, creative, and production talent all in-house, we can bring fully integrated thinking to the table for our clients from day one, and our Fixed Flex Model enables us to tap a robust network of freelance partners to serve both project and AOR assignments and scale up and down based on speed to market and budget considerations.
We smash the big-agency hierarchy. At GYK, leaders are “player-coaches.” Our President, Pam Hamlin (former Global CEO of Arnold), doesn’t sit on the sidelines; she’s in the trenches with the team. Clients don’t just get access to senior leadership during the pitch process — they get their brains on the work, every day. Bye-bye, bait and switch.
We reject autopilot and the status quo. Too many agencies chase shiny objects or recycle last year’s big idea. We use our curiosity, strategic insights, and creativity to unlock business impact through channel-agnostic solutions that are right for our clients’ brands; not just shoehorned into a campaign because it’s the latest fad.
We do more with less. At nearly 1/15th the budget of their largest competitors, we helped Ken’s leapfrog Kraft to become #2 in salad dressings with 15% YoY sales growth nationally, and Cedar’s Hummus compete against PepsiCo-owned Sabra and climb from #5 to #2 in the U.S. We’ve proven over and over that strategic thinking and scrappy execution beat bloated budgets.
Our independence and “left of center” mentality allows us to make the decisions that are right for our people and clients; we have no interest in looking to or following the lead of our larger agency competitors. It’s important to leaders at GYK that we foster a company culture and environment that enables our people to do some of the best work of their careers — because if you take care of your teams, they’ll take care of your clients. Here are a few ways we live that belief:
Our benefits are indie by design. A key part of our company culture is to reward our people’s hard work with the gift of time. Twice a year for the past 10+ years, we’ve shut down the agency for the weeks of July 4th and Christmas so that people can recharge and power down their laptops all at the same time. That, on top of unlimited PTO, Summer Fridays, paid volunteer days, a robust holiday calendar, and 12 weeks of fully paid parental leave, is part of the way we help foster wellbeing and rest in a fast-paced industry known for burning people out.
A culture of listening and investing in growth. Our Talent team knows that a “heard” culture is a happy culture. It’s why we host Employee Roundtables twice a year and distribute an annual Employee Engagement Survey. But we don’t just listen; we report back to the agency on our findings, to ensure our people know their voices are being heard and how their feedback is being acted on. And our HYPE program brings up to 10% of the agency’s highest performers on a journey of professional development, with a $2500 per employee stipend to fuel their growth and yearlong access to executive team mentorship.
Curiosity and experimentation are baked in. Through our “NOW, NEXT” program, we experiment with and educate our people on the trends, tools, and technologies that can elevate our creative and media products, create efficiencies, and innovate on behalf of our clients. We deploy both cross-functional teams and our summer internship class to explore anything from early-stage social trends to generative AI to the latest evolutions in CPG and e-commerce. Being independent means we don’t have to wait for permission to play with what’s next — we just do it.
We’re obsessed with keeping people informed and inspired. To continue to stay ahead of the curve, we created several company-wide Slack channels, like #ShitYouShouldSee and #CreativeTech, that serve up a curated collection of work that’s breaking through in culture, channel updates, research reports, technology news, and more. On top of sending our people to industry events, from the West Coast to Cannes, to report back on the forces and innovations impacting brand marketing and our clients’ categories, we also hold a weekly “Teach Me Tuesday” session, hosting lunch & learns, MasterClass courses, and training modules to keep us sharp and inspired.
At a time when many agencies are struggling to grow, GYK is on pace for 12% overall YoY growth in revenue and is experiencing one of its best new business periods in company history. From September 2024-2025, the agency brought in $1.9M in new business revenue; a whopping 126% lift over September 2023-2024. GYK won competitive national bids with Liberty Mutual and Milo’s Tea Company and added a total of nine new clients to its roster – including brands like Barrel One Collective (Harpoon, Dunkin’ Spiked, Long Trail, etc.), Tomorrow Golf League, University of New Hampshire, and Culture Pop Soda.
But enough about us, let’s talk about how our independence has enabled us to deliver meaningful impact for some additional clients:
After opening its doors in 1975, GYK became a force to be reckoned with in New Hampshire. But a lot can change in 50 years, especially when it comes to the marketing landscape. So, when Travis York became CEO of GYK in 2011, he was on a mission to chart the course for the agency’s next chapter of growth — and he knew he needed the right leaders to partner with him on that journey.
Both Travis York and our President, Pam Hamlin, came from the big agency world (Havas/ Euro RSCG and Arnold). Travis, as a longtime investor, and Pam, as the ultimate creative problem solver, had a mutual ambition to build something more entrepreneurial that could stay ahead of the curve and quickly pivot to meet evolving industry challenges head-on — and they knew that a midsized indie agency would be best equipped for the job.
In 2019, Travis and Pam joined forces to not only position GYK as a “Creative Growth Engine” for its clients and fuel its own growth trajectory, but to build a new model altogether.
So, that same year, they launched York Creative Collective (YCC) — an entrepreneurial ecosystem of independently-owned companies that share our belief in creativity as a strategic lever for growth. When ventures need branding, creative, media, or production support, they can turn to GYK as the growth engine powering the collective. If they need strategic business counsel, operations support, or supplementary capital, ventures are given access to a comprehensive suite of resources to help them grow and thrive, so they can prioritize and focus on their passion and product innovation.
The YCC model further proves that our team doesn’t just talk about growing brands, we live it. From footwear and apparel companies like YORK Athletics and Seaav to premium drum maker Noble & Cooley to media companies like TorchPro and Iron & Air, YCC ventures are powered by the same creativity and problem-solving skills that GYK offers its clients.
At the end of the day, our origin story matters less than our innovation story. Because it’s not about how you start out — it’s about the risks you take and the impact you make along the way.
For most of GYK’s 50 years in operation, the agency was mostly unknown outside of its Manchester, NH homebase; maybe even modest to a fault. So, the first order of business under Pam’s leadership was to build GYK’s visibility and reputation across New England. And we needed the right team to make it happen.
To bring the agency’s creative work, brand and business development, operations, and culture to the next level, and create a bit of a “holy shit, what’s happening over at GYK?!” vibe around Boston, Travis and Pam recruited team members with an appetite for growth and experience working for some of the biggest players in the market. They brought on new department heads from leading agencies and brands to guide the creative, media, strategy, communications, and finance functions, seeking folks with a shared ambition for excellence, innovation, and creativity.
Then, with our collective networks and tenacious personalities combined, we let loose on the region. Putting relationship-building at the center of GYK’s biz dev and marketing strategy, we showed up everywhere the big agencies did, and then some. We couldn’t hang our hats on Super Bowl spots or flashy Cannes Lions campaigns, so we built our reputation and credibility by creating work that was unforgettable — and being everywhere you looked.
We pushed GYK to the forefront of the local advertising scene, locking in board member and advisory committee positions within The Ad Club Boston for our Heads of Creative, Media, and Marketing, helping to set the tone and programming for industry conversations. Through a robust PR and awards strategy, we elevated the profile of our work, our innovative integrated approach, and the jaw-dropping results we achieved for clients across the portfolio. No longer a “best kept secret,” GYK’s work began earning coverage in all the major ad industry trades and has even hit the likes of The Wall Street Journal, Chronicle, The Boston Globe, USA Today, ESPN, NESN, CBS News Boston, and NBC 10 Boston.
Like many midsized indie agencies, GYK has had to fight the perception that “independent” means “small-time” — but we have a big-time hunger to compete against holding company agencies, and win. Which is why it tasted extra sweet when not once, but two years in a row, we went up against agencies like Arnold and Hill Holliday for “Best Of Show” at The Ad Club’s Hatch Awards; the biggest advertising competition in New England. And in October 2024, we brought home the win. That was the cherry on top of an awards season that also included two Emmy wins, a Clio Sports trophy, and much more — but most importantly, establishing that GYK was not just on the map – but here to play, and here to stay.
Independence is the antidote to an industry accustomed to bureaucracy, bloated budgets, and buzzwords over business results. The future of independent agencies isn’t just about who can make something faster or cheaper — it’s about finding your people; people with a shared ambition for freedom, shaking off the status quo, and seeking opportunities to do things more effectively than they’ve ever been done before. It’s why, at GYK, Autopilot is our Enemy; Creativity is Our Expertise; and Impact is Our Endgame.
Independence is so much more than our business model; it’s our vision for the future. Free from the limitations of holding company agendas (praise be), at GYK, we can define our own path; one that’s centered on relentless curiosity, entrepreneurial energy, and an ambition to build what’s next in an ever-evolving industry. Independence allows us to define and invest in the people and places we consider innovative and impactful — and that can look a little different when you’re not just following someone else’s lead. We can explore new ventures as boldly as we build our clients’ brands and continue to make creativity the catalyst for enduring business growth.
We believe the future belongs to agencies — like GYK — with a team so tightly aligned around creativity and business impact and so averse to big agency bullshit, that together, can do anything. Can we think smarter and move faster? Hell yes. But a lot of people can say that. GYK’s superpower is not just our independence — it’s *our* team, something you can’t get anywhere else. Because when we want to build something, and bring our integrated team of strategy, creative, media, and production all together to the same table from day one, *we* and no one else, get to define the next generation of ideas, innovation, and impact for our people and partners. And that’s how you keep it weird, keep it human, and grow brands and businesses.
