Ara is one of New Zealand's biggest tertiary education providers, training students across trades, hospitality, engineering and health for jobs that start the moment they graduate. The brief was a brand and recruitment campaign proving what sets Ara apart: industry-connected tutors, real working study environments, and training based on what employers want. We named it Advantage You, built on one idea: studying at Ara gives you such a head start that your last day of study will be lik your first day on the job.

To make that argument visually, we built a typeface out of the trades themselves. Every letterform was handmade from the materials, tools and processes used across each study areas, then photographed and vectorised into a full working typeface. We developed the concept with Bob's Your Uncle agency, then built the campaign design and typography in-house, running it across bus bags, bill stickers, billboards and posters, web and digital across New Zealand. More than 120 Ara students,graduates and staff were used on the visuals and the campaign became a key part of Ara's identity and internal processes in the few years that follow before the merge with Te Pūkenga.