Soar With Us
Leeds
Website: Soar With Us
Type of agency: Direct-to-consumer
Founders: Oliver Hudson and Joe Marston
Year founded: 2019
Headcount: 120
Office: Leeds
It’s definitely a lot bigger than we thought it would be at the start.
Profile
For many people, starting a successful business at university will only ever be a pipedream. But not for Oliver Hudson and Joe Marston, the co-founders of direct-to-consumer ecommerce agency Soar With Us.
Two school friends from North Yorkshire, Olly and Joe have spent the past six years scaling a business that has, quite literally, soared in the paid social space. It has found its groove working exclusively with ecommerce and DTC brands in the UK, with its knack for Meta and TikTok ads delivering more than £200m in revenue for clients to-date.
Around 120 employees and 65 brands are currently soaring with Joe and Olly, including Trip CBD, Mindful Chef and Cowshed.
The past couple of years have marked a particular step change for the agency. After acquiring a majority stake in Hambi Media to bolster its creative services and innovation in 2024, Soar With Us has been re-building its processes and operations from the ground up. Fundamentally, this has meant integrating AI into all parts of the business.
People, however, will remain a core part of the agency’s future; Olly and Joe have worked hard to create a strong culture and position Soar With Us as an attractive place to work. This year, they launched their ‘Creative Strategist Incubator’, a new nine-month programme designed to grow and nurture the next generation of creative talent, which received almost 400 applications.
While some agencies opt to hire senior execs with years of experience, Olly and Joe believe in giving new talent a chance – both for the benefit of people and for business.
“You’ve got to mold people into your culture and standards in a way that’s very hard to do with someone who comes with bad habits from previous ways of working - especially if you’re a fast-moving start-up,” says Olly.
With hundreds of applications for its junior talent incubator, a couple of potential acquisitions on the backburner and plans to expand into the US over the next 12-18 months, this humble university idea is very well-placed for its next growth spurt.