Five things Daylight learned in its five years

Written by Lee Lowndes - May 12, 2026

In January 2021, while the world was still figuring out how to work from home, Daylight opened its doors. The timing wasn't planned. It was built from a moment. A global organisation had a specific but vitally important need: how do you help the world understand the largest public health crisis in modern history? That founding partner was the World Health Organization. 

At this moment, Daylight grew out of The Spinoff's newsroom. 

The work grew quickly across government and the private sector, and it became clear there was something bigger here than a unit inside a publisher. In 2021, Daylight broke away as an independent studio. I'd met Charlie Godinet during my time at Colenso BBDO, where we'd worked together across clients including IAG and DB Breweries, and over a beer at the Elbow Room, he came on board to establish our wider creative offering. Also there from the start was Kristen Morris, now General Manager, who led the agency's founding relationship with the WHO and brought her international creative agency and NGO experience to the business.

In 2022, Daylight merged with Translate Digital, extending the studio's capabilities into digital product and technology. Lizzie Robson joined as Partner to lead the digital arm, bringing international experience working with global technology brands. Phil Bingley joined as technology lead, bringing his background in enterprise software delivery.

Today, our core offering still holds true. Daylight is about the right people, for the right problem, at the right time. Five years on, here's what we've learned along the way.

The brief behind the brief is usually the real opportunity.

Clients rarely arrive knowing exactly what they need. Our most enduring relationships are the ones where the first conversation went somewhere unexpected, where the problem turned out to be more interesting than the one in the original brief. An AI-powered search tool that unlocks decades of marine research data for Sustainable Seas. A global documentary series capturing indigenous and traditional medicine practices across 16 countries. The work that matters most rarely starts with a clear answer. We've learned to sit in the uncertainty, help clients do the same, and trust that's exactly where the best ideas come from.

Fewer layers mean more speed.

The most valuable thing we can offer a client hasn’t been a process or a detailed framework,it’s experienced senior people in the room together who can make quick yet considered decisions. As organisations get bigger and more complex, the ability to move quickly but with purpose becomes much more rare. 

You can't bolt the brand on at the end.

The strongest work sits at the intersection of brand and experience. Where the story a client tells about themselves is the same story a customer feels when they use the product. Safeswim feels the same on a street poster as it does on your phone at 7 am before a swim. Billy doesn't just inform; it gives consumers the confidence to act. That consistency isn't accidental. It's what happens when a brand is treated as a foundational thread. Not a logo or a campaign signed off and handed over. A thread that runs through every decision, from the first touchpoint to the last.

The best work becomes part of people’s lives 

Trends move fast. There's always a new format, a new platform, a new reason to throw out what you were doing last quarter and start again. The work we're most proud of (and which has been the most effective) isn't a campaign that turned heads just for the sake of it; it's products people are still using. Safeswim, checked each time it rains. Billy pulled up when a power bill lands. HOME, a digital platform for 6,000 people in a study they've been part of since birth. That kind of staying power doesn't come from chasing what's new. It comes from making something genuinely useful, crafted deeply to hold value and humble enough to get out of the user's way.

Build the team for the work you want, not the work you have.

The merger with Translate Digital in 2022 wasn't about capacity. It was about becoming the kind of studio that could take on harder, more interesting problems. Journalists, engineers, and product designers working alongside agency creatives, animators and producers. That mix is what lets us go places traditional models can't: rolling out content and data visualisations for global NGOs, tackling complex behaviour-change briefs, and building national price-comparison platforms with a brand at their core.

So, what’s next from here for Daylight? More of the same, and then some. With an established client roster across APAC and Europe, our focus  is on growing its impact, taking what's been built over five years and applying it to bigger problems, in more places.