Founder of failed digital agency Topia Project Nyree Corby moves to Sapient Nitro
Nyree Corby, who created digital agency The Topia Project which went into administration owing more than 40 creditors in excess of a million dollars, has re-emerged as national business strategy director of Sapient Nitro.
She founded The Topia Project in 2005. But in 2009 Topia’s financial troubles became terminal. The Topia Project’s name was changed to CHD Marketing Services and The Topia Project name was sold to a company called Direct Media Consulting. Corby then became the CEO of the new company which continued to work from the same office with the same employees and service the same clients.
But Corby has now joined Sapient Nitro, along with digital strategist Ravi Prasad, who was previously Topia’s head of strategy.
She went public yesterday by accepting Sapient Nitro’s two awards at yesterday’s Mumbrella Readers Choice Awards. The agency won social media campaign of the year for Tourism Queensland’s Best Job in the World and it was also awarded creative agency of the year.
Corby declined to comment on Topia, but said that it was still in operation. However, the phone number listed on the website appears to be out of order and when Mumbrella visited the address listed on the Topia website, nobody was there. Neighbouring businesses told Mumbrella that nobody had been working from that office for some time.
In May, Topia’s website listed clients including Sensis, UBD, Village Roadshow, Dyson, Centrebet, RM Williams and the Canadian tourist body. This information has since been removed and it is not known what clients it works with currently.
At the time Corby said: “The financial problems were caused by a combination of my youthful optimism, some bad debts and poor financial advice.” And she said then of the new Topia Project: “Solid, stable, well funded and well resourced; The Topia Project will continue to provide a results-driven marketing approach for our clients and can achieve our vision of being the new breed of agency required for today’s media environment.”
Michael Branagh, Sapient Nitro’s national managing director, told Mumbrella: “I do know the history of Topia. We’ve taken her on with respect as an individual. It’s arm’s length, in terms of the history of Topia.” He said that at this stage no clients had come across from Topia to Sapient Nitro.
In a press release he added: “I think our investment in Nyree and Ravi will prove a wise one.
“We are looking to Nyree to help grow our business nationally. She brings to our agency a tenacious attitude that we intend to leverage to ensure that the momentum created through our success in 2009 continues into 2010 and beyond.”
Tim Burrowes founded Mumbrella in 2008. He worked on Mumbrella until 2021. At various points he was editor, content director and editor-at-large.
Linkedin
(Edited for legal reasons)
User ID not verified.
HA! Youthful optimism? (Edited for legal reasons)… I think that this report is a responsible approach from Mumbrella to ensure clients (and staff at SN) know (edited for legal reasons) what they’re dealing with…
User ID not verified.
read the first paragraph – how can you appoint that record as a head of business strategy??
User ID not verified.
(Deleted for legal reasons)
User ID not verified.
Oops – sorry…
Here’s the thing. Most agency folk with a brain in their heads recognise that a client comes on board for the people in the team, not the experience of the agency.
“Yes it’s very nice that you’ve won Mumbrella’s Reader’s Choice Award, but what’s this I’ve heard about your new national business strategy director?” said potential client.
Regardless of the agency’s perceived industry success, clients generally start up and stay with an agency if they respect the individuals running their accounts.
Which poses a question for all you would be clients lining up to talk with SN about how you can become the next big thing…
User ID not verified.
(Deleted for legal reasons)
User ID not verified.
Is it me, or does Mumbrella have a little list of people they can’t resist to target?
McCann Erickson is closing its Brisbane office, sixteen jobs will be lost. When the Brisbane MD gets a new job will Mumbrella report “failed MD gets a new job” – I don’t think so.
Is it a slow news day or something?
And is there actually any point to this story? I’ve re-read it a few times and still can’t figure out what it’s getting at.
Is this just insinuation disguised as reporting? Is Mumbrella becoming the ‘Who Weekly’ of trade journals?
Entrepreneurs can fail, agencies can fail; we know advertising is a difficult business.
Things can happen. Good people can get hurt and those responsible for running the agencies have to live with the burden.
And if you do make mistakes and if things do go wrong, what are we expected to do? Are we expected to give up? No, we learn lessons, we try to make amends and we move on.
Unfortunately, it seems that Mumbrella doesn’t want us to do that.
User ID not verified.
At least these comments are being posted by Mumbrella. I know another advertising blog that very much shapes the debate to favour certain people and certain agencies.
User ID not verified.
To “Eek…”
(edited for legal reasons)
User ID not verified.
(edited for legal reasons)
User ID not verified.
(edited for legal reasons)…..
User ID not verified.
Although Topia’s history is a legitimate topic for debate, unfortunately, I’m going to have to close our comments thread on this one for legal reasons.
Eek, to answer your questions, I certainly don’t feel that anyone should be pilloried for trying & failing (for instance, here’s what we wrote about The One Centre, for instance: https://mumbrella.com.au/death-of-the-one-centre-bad-news-for-the-whole-industry-5771 )
However the issues with Topia were not identical to that case.
Cheers,
Tim – Mumbrella