Simon Dixon, co-founder of DixonBaxi, one of the UK's most respected design studios, recently shared his insights on building a successful creative agency during a talk with The Studio, Creative Boom's professional network. Dixon emphasized that their journey to working with prestigious clients like Formula 1, AC Milan, and the Premier League wasn't an overnight success, but rather the result of 24 years of persistent dedication and strategic decision-making.
"We have this idea that we're a 24-year overnight success," Dixon explained to the online audience. "People ask us, how do you have an agency, how do you get these clients, how do you get whatever? It's years and years of just showing up and hopefully people liking what you do." Despite DixonBaxi's impressive client roster, Dixon revealed that the reality behind their success is far more nuanced, built on patient persistence rather than instant recognition.
At the core of DixonBaxi's philosophy lies what Dixon calls "design for life." The studio operates under the principle of democratized design, aiming to create work that resonates with diverse audiences across the globe. "We want to design for everyone, everywhere," he explained. "We like the power of democratized design. So we like the fact that we can design for someone in Mexico City and someone in Berlin and someone in Leeds and someone in York."
However, Dixon acknowledged the challenges that come with designing at scale. "Typically, when you design at scale, it can get a bit rounded and homogenized. So we want to design with intent. That's what's important to us, the people we design for," he noted. This commitment to intentional design has become a defining characteristic of the studio's approach to creative work.
A pivotal moment in DixonBaxi's evolution came when the founders realized that success wasn't about the quantity of work they took on, but rather about carefully curating what they chose not to do. "We realized that it wasn't about what we did," Simon recalls. "It was curating what we didn't do, saying no and refusing certain things. Being busy doesn't make us successful. Making money isn't the definition of success."
This realization led to a systematic evaluation of their values and a bold decision that many would consider commercial suicide. "We resigned six clients, our parents, our bank manager, and a lot of the team thought that was a bit of a crazy idea. But it freed us up. It created this situation where we could talk about what we believe in. The things that actually matter underneath the design, underneath the creativity. The things that drive what we do."
Dixon was refreshingly honest about the financial cost of taking such a principled stand. "Belief costs," he admitted. "It's a hard thing to make choices where you turn work down and you don't do certain things. But we believe that it's worth paying that price anyway and self-determining." The studio decided they no longer wanted to work with disrespectful and pessimistic people, work for free on pitches, or collaborate with toxic clients.
From this period of reflection emerged two crucial lists that now guide everything DixonBaxi does. The first focuses on creative purpose, emphasizing risk-taking work, optimism, curiosity, and embracing uncertainty. "We like the idea of risk-taking work," Simon explained. "Being optimistic, showing up, being curious, embracing uncertainty, and that thrill of creating for a living and doing something fresh."
The second list addresses how they want to work as a team and organization. "We want to embrace that change in a positive way and work the way that suits us and the team. Be diverse, equitable, and emotionally intelligent. Be there for people, take risks and do the right things," Dixon outlined. Patience, he emphasized, underpins both approaches, as building a good career takes time and cannot be rushed.
Following this period of self-reinvention, DixonBaxi began attracting work that truly reflected their evolved values, leading to more thoughtful and human-centered projects with clients like AC Milan and the Premier League. However, for Dixon, the real measure of success isn't found in prestigious client wins but in the people who make up the studio.
"The work is important, the style of work, but it's the people that are most important," he told the audience. "Behind me through the glass are 52 other people. And for me, it's not Dixon and Baxi. It's the space between those two people, and we share that with those 52 people, and that's where I get my joy now—seeing them creating things that define their career. And our job really is to create the space for them to do that."
Rather than passively waiting for industry trends to dictate their direction, DixonBaxi takes an active approach to shaping its future through an initiative called "Super Futures." This annual creative sabbatical involves shutting down the entire studio for a week of creative exploration and experimentation. "Next week the entire studio is going to shut for a week and we're going to take a creative sabbatical, make things, do some talks, do some charts, do lots of different things just to creatively reboot," Dixon revealed.
Last year's Super Futures experiment was particularly ambitious, giving every team member—not just designers—four weeks to create a personal project. "Everybody got four weeks to make a project. Not just the designers; the producers, the finance people, the growth people, the studio assistant, everybody in the studio. And they all made something. It was amazing because we had these 50 projects all using new technologies," Dixon explained.
The philosophy behind investing significant time in creative exploration is rooted in Dixon's belief that differentiation comes from thinking differently rather than just using the same tools as everyone else. "When the tools are all the same, thinking differently is a superpower," he pointed out. "So if you're using software and systems and intelligent technologies, you all end up at the same place. Whereas if you start to think, how do I use that technology for a different reason, a personal reason, a team reason, you come up with something more specific to you."
One particularly striking example from their Super Futures initiative involved Hayden, one of the studio's producers, who created an AR experience for AC Milan despite having no formal creative training. "He made an AR experience for AC Milan. He built it himself. So you could go into the crowd as an AC Milan fan and feel what it was like to be an AC Milan fan. This guy is a producer. He didn't train in creativity, but he made an AR project. And it shows you that if you create space, anybody can create."
DixonBaxi's approach to creativity and client relationships is exemplified in their remarkable 20-year relationship with Formula 1, which began as a television graphics project and evolved into a comprehensive brand system for a global audience. The challenge was immense, requiring a design system that could work for dramatically different audiences across various markets.
"In Europe, people understand the history of the sport," explained Dixon. "They know the flags, the teams, the locations. They watch three hours of it, the buildup, everything. But in Asia, which is a new market, it's all about celebrity. It's about lifestyle. It's about behind the scenes and 'drive to survive'. In North America, which is the other growth market, they watch three to four minutes of highlights and don't watch the race at all."
To address these diverse audience needs, DixonBaxi emphasizes human insight over pure data analysis. "Creativity at any kind of scale, when you're dealing with hundreds of millions of people, is pointless without insight," Simon reasoned. "You're just guessing otherwise. So we want insight. But the problem is not everybody's Gen Z, and not everyone's a piece of data. Not everyone's a user. They're human beings. They're people."
The studio's creative process includes a distinctively collaborative approach they call "a campfire," designed to find meaningful signals among the noise of information and ideas. "This is where we try and find the signal in the noise... the whole team lays the work out on the table and everybody around the table has an equal voice at that point. It doesn't matter if you're an ECD, a producer or an intern. We're looking at the work, not your work," Dixon explained.
Overall, Dixon's session with The Studio offered not a traditional blueprint for agency success, but rather a masterclass in building a business around principles rather than just profit. His insights demonstrated that sustainable success comes from patient relationship-building rather than quick wins, and that the most powerful creative work emerges when organizations dare to define success on their own terms. As Dixon concluded, "Our job really is to ignore the noise and create things that cut through and make a difference. The strongest work really isn't about chasing relevance; it creates its own relevance."
