What a year we had in 2017. Company development was in full swing and one thing was for sure; we were no longer a start-up getting our toes wet, we were fully jumping in the digital marketing deep end! From January 2017 to now, the pack has grown from 5 pups to 9 and our client list is forever expanding with the best businesses we could wish for.
The year kicked off with a new Upperdog website. Joel and Lloyd, our development squad, worked their paws off creating a design fuelled, captivating website built using the latest technology in development; Polymer. It was a trek into the unknown, and Zhara’s head did combust on multiple occasions! The site looks fantastic and reflects our creativity, hard work and culture. We survived the January darkness.
Springing forward
As Spring reared its daffodil head, we were in full swing of development and SEO. Morning agile meetings became a staple feature of Upperdog’s Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays. This involves the team standing up and presenting our tasks like the weather – we all get to know what each other is working on – helping with motivation and organisation. Milo added his to do’s for the day (funnily enough it was to sleep every time). Another feature of a typical Upperdog day was the 2.30pm exercise for 1 minute – you can guess how long that lasted. We prefer Krispy Kremes…whoops!
Spring was filled with highs and lows. We bid farewell to Jack, our Bournemouth Uni intern who worked his tail off for 6 months, over the backtrack of Celine’s My Heart Will Go On. As one goes another arrives, in the form of Scott, a third-year student who was in a band – aside from SEO his purpose was to keep us young and hip.
We welcomed summer with open arms and gained another marketing genius – Beth. A lover of Japanese soaps, Marvel comics and green smoothies, she glided into the office to become an essential sidekick for Amy and Annabel – and encourage us away from M&S.
Lake a fish out of water
The best was still to come. The team worked incredibly hard, we acquired several new clients and were achieving great results through our SEO, PPC and development services. Zhara treated us to the ultimate summer day out; the New Forest Water park! An inflatable assault course over water was the ultimate steam buster, we worked great as a team and came out smiling, albeit wet, on the other side.
Zhara and Lloyd turned the big 3-0. Zhara celebrated with her first and well-deserved holiday since she started the company and left her trusted team to run the office (Annabel went reluctantly, there was no M&S in Mexico). It went without a hitch and the team held the fort (there was a fire next door, but we won’t delve into that).
Summer ended. Milo barked. Amy got engaged, despite him not owning a jet ski or a dog. Our client list was close to doubling since the start of the year. This called for the team to grow. 2 years and several enthusiastic phone calls with clients resulted in Amy’s promotion to Account Manager. The team swears they saw her tail wag.
Winter strutted its rainy way in and the development team completed their biggest project so far. Mandarin Stone is a high-end retailer of tiles and a big one at that – Joel, Lloyd and Rob, our designer, worked tooth and nail to build the ultimate ecommerce site and did a fantastic job. The office was alight with exciting projects and the year continued to whizz by.
The first pupperdog
We celebrated Halloween with pumpkin carving and spooky treats. Milo barked at the balloons. The highlight of the year was our very own Upperdog baby. Lloyd Parnell and his wife welcomed a baby girl named Tess in November, and we were very lucky to show Tess her desk 18 years in advance. Bets on that she’ll be a toe-tapping dev wizard!
We celebrated Christmas with a delicious meal at Miller and Carter. Milo barked at his non-existent steak. We celebrated January with year progress reviews for our clients and marvelled at the impact of our work.
The December holidays flew past and we geared ourselves up for January 2018.
With more progress anticipated, Jake, another Bournemouth University student joined us and underwent a blog writing and citation extravaganza. He likes football and made us feel even younger at heart – (we now know what ‘peak’ means!)
Work work work work work work. Rihanna reflected Upperdog’s work ethic and the team needed another team building exercise. Off to The MacGuffin Project escape room we went and out we popped an embarrassing 45 minutes later. Shameful but it was great fun!
1, 2, 3, 4, 5!
Before we knew it, it was Upperdog’s 5th birthday and we celebrated the only way we knew how – building wooden animals and eating pancakes. We swear we work!
The team needed to grow even further, with the addition of another designer to make websites, emails and other marketing materials shine. Oliver swayed us with his creative blue eyes and passion for beer (wait, did he only choose us because we have Beer Fridays…?) A new swanky desk was installed, and the team could no longer indulge in footsie.
We’re a close-knit team, bonded like we’re family, working hard like we’re proppa grafters with one aim in mind; to create fantastic, working websites for our clients and love the work environment we’re in. How lucky!
If we seem like the Brady bunch and you want to get involved, why not get in touch to become a part of 2018? We offer web design, web development and digital marketing services – call us on 01202 798 820 or email hello@upperdog.co.uk.
