[December 2009] After a week of teasers from our illustrious leaders about The FARM Christmas party, the office down tools at 10.30am to begin the day's events (one particular producer managed to keep working whilst simultaeounsly being briefed in on Christmas activities - our talents know no bounds!)

Split into teams early in the week The FARMers were presented with a number of challenges to earn points before the big day:

1. Pick a Sydney suburb

2. Pick a dress theme to go with that suburb

3. Put together a presentation called '2009 - a year in review'

4. Design a piece of retro pixel art for the next FARM feature wall

5. Deliver the highest ROI on a $2 coin 

Teams then embarked on the first 'FARM Great Race'around Sydney, figuring out clues at one destination to get to the next. Bonus points awarded for team photos at each check point. Bonus bonus points awarded for the randoms coerced into participating in said photos, Bonus bonus bonus points for being told by management to 'slow down and stop for a drink' and actually beating our leaders to the finish line!

Introducing the teams!

Fire from the Shire led by Anthony Dang (missing from this team photo!)

Eastern Creek Grid Girls led by Aaron Powell 

Wentworthville Wiggas led by Nikki Sulentic

Double Bay Sailing Club led by the marvellous Chris Martin who delivered his team victory (and a 3 course meal at The Bentley)

After suitable team banter (and some outright bar fights) the FARM jumped a water taxi to Shark Island for a long and lazy BBQ, soaking up the rays in the middle of Sydney Harbour. 

Many thanks to our 'life-guards' Chris P and JG for putting on a great day!

[December 2009] Our lovely friends at Ferrero surprise the team with a goodie box choc-full of scrumptious delights!

We are very happy FARMers!! Thanks Ferrero!

Congrats to Wade, Karis, Brooke and Nina for the great start on Ferrero and to all in the studio that brought the ideas to life! 

As part of the ongoing work pimping the FARM offices we are proud to unveil our new feature wall painted by local artist Chris Tibbles.

The FARMers pitched in true DIY style to prep the wall before Chris arrived to work his magic.  With the help of tall Paul getting the rollers to reach the top of the wall this was much easier than anticpated!

Under the direction of designer Nikki (who put in many hours supervising this transformation!) the hills motif from The FARM website was interpreted by Chris into a work of art! 

Thanks for  your amazing work Chris! The FARM is very proud to show off it's newest masterpiece - taking centre stage at the upcoming Xmas party! 

Thanks our good friends at Zip Industries the office has been fitted with a Zip Hydrotap for all our water needs! Much to the elation of staff the Hydrotap's speedy water flow, sleek and compact look and instant boiling and chilled water rendered our old slow and bulky machine INFERIOR! No more waiting 5 mins for the system to heat and then dispense our tea in a slow trickle!

Thank you ZIP!

The FARM are excited to hear the Aveeno™ NZ online media campaign (under the Johnson&Johnson client suite) has won the first every Bolly Award! This is an award that has been set up by the Internet Advertising Bureau in NZ to celebrate the best digital creative in NZ.  

http://www.bollyawards.co.nz/

Feedback from OMD in NZ: "Well done, the creative for this campaign has been the talk of the industry and a lot of people (including me) think it’s just amazing."

The campaign performed really well with an average dwell time on the rich media placements of 76.25 seconds and engagement rate of 25.85%.

[2009] The FARM is very proud to announce that WiggleTime! has received a Highly Recommended mention in the 2009 Kidspot Best of Awards! We are very pleased to be recognised in the realm of children's education and online learning. A testament to the heights achieved by the FARM's design and development teams. Let's get Wiggling!

For the first time in Farmer of the Month history, the September award after much deliberation was a tie! The masses celebrated the leadership of Executive Producer, Chris Rann and Creative Director, Wade Kuhn for the hard yards they consistently put in at The FARM.

[September 2009] To raise awareness for the launch of Taubmans Endure there was a significant media spend focused on key channels, TV and online. To support this activity TheFARM developed a new Taubmans site destination and the online media campaign.

Targeted at DIY consumers, the site heroes Endure on the homepage and provides technical product information. The site seamlessly drove visitors through to Endure content and provided details on their nearest stockist.

Delivered in a testimonial style, the TVC featured real painters and was extended online through video banners and standard formats. Integrity with the advertising was maintained through the capture of footage for use in digital channels.

[September 2009] The FARM have completed the first round of site updates to the ZIP Industries web build completed in early 2009.

Returning to the key brief of "providing consumers and industry with easy access to product" the FARM developed a new UI to support ZIP's complex product attributes and integrated Flash components in to the navigation system that ultimately provided users with the most seamless solution possible. 

The dynamic expandable navigation panel and brand new flash carousel product selector use the blue and white colour palette of ZIP with chrome textures, making for a slick and visually impressive experience. 

To celebrate a huge few months at The FARM and to welcome some new faces, the team headed out for a lazy (but always competitive) Friday afternoon of lawn bowls at the Clovelly Bowling Club.

Perched atop the headland overlooking Coogee, hungry FARMers were greeted by Rann and JG already cooking up a mammoth BBQ to steel their stomachs before the high endurance bowl off. Shocking the locals, our pack of ruffians devoured our feast and warmed our hearts with ale making our way through almost all of Rann's rather indulgent grocery shopping spree.

Just as all hope of actually bowling rapidly began to vanish into the social smorgasboard our highly organised GM announced the state of play (pre prepared of course!) and the drawing of the teams. 

New FARMer, Phil did the honours of selecting the 4 teams captains and in a true performance of fitting in all too quick latched onto Rann’s compulsion to come 2nd at everything by aptly naming his team:

Rann 4 2nd
Team Captain: Phil
Guesty, CP, Aaron and Tom

Celebrating the memory of our one time French Farmer, Charlotte the next team captain Nina also aptly named her team:

Flambon Gala’s
Team Captain: Nina
Dan, Nikki, David and Wade

To encompass all the raw Aussie power brewing in the pre game BBQ, K1’s team were named by the resident Canadian:

Frogs in Socks
Team Captain: K1
C3, Kat, Shannon and Hugo

No one really seemed to know what Paul's team name meant...

Infighting
Team Captain: Paul
Sam, Karis, Rann and Owen

The teams then lined up for bowling boot camp "little picture on the inside and account for the SE wind" 

LET THE GAMES BEGIN!

With some failing to grasp the ‘little picture on the inside’ rule curve balls abounded across the field with desperate mid game searches for the full set of light bulbs, schooners, chess boards and rather misleading anchors. Karis was under pressure on her debut bowl by earlier proclaiming her penchant for lawn bowls only to earn the handicap of the 'Dorrigan Hook'. 

Frogs in Socks ripped up the bowling green and emerged undefeated until the historic final bowl from the opposing team. So confident in their win, Frogs in Socks bowled a strategic curve ball by Hugo into the neighboring lane for fear of jeopardizing their own victory. But they were slapped with the hand of irony as JG bowled a perfect (and pure lucky) last bowl of the day. Our illustrious leader jumped for joy flanked by C3 and K1 who screamed with the agony of epic bad luck until they collapsed sobbing to the ground in an unbelievable last minute defeat.