Best for: Startups and scale-ups — from pre-launch through Series B and beyond — that need brand to do commercial work from day one. Particularly strong for consumer DTC, fintech, health, and outdoor/lifestyle companies where identity, packaging, digital experience, and campaign all need to operate as one. Also increasingly relevant for B2B and fintech companies seeking the kind of brand clarity more typically associated with consumer brands.g.
Red Antler didn't just get lucky with a few famous clients — they built an entire category. Before anyone else was talking about branding as a startup growth lever, they were in rooms with founders before their products had names. The result is the most battle-tested pre-launch branding methodology in the US market, and a portfolio of outcomes — Casper, Allbirds, Hinge, AllTrails, Ramp, Chime — that makes the argument for them better than any pitch deck could. The honest caveat is that the DTC aesthetic they helped define is now so pervasive that differentiation requires real creative conviction. The best Red Antler work still has it.
Reviewed by Chelsea Greene
The Full Read
In 2007, Emily Heyward and JB Osborne — both account planners at Saatchi & Saatchi — left advertising to do something that didn't exist yet: a branding agency built specifically for startups. They recruited Simon Endres as creative director and set up in Brooklyn, working with founders before product launch, before company names, sometimes before the product itself was fully formed.
The timing was almost comically perfect. The DTC wave hit a few years later, and Red Antler was already fluent in the language. They named Allbirds. They positioned Casper as a lifestyle brand for the well-rested — helping it reach $20M in revenue in its first year and eventually a public listing. They built Hinge into the fastest-growing dating app. They gave Chime the brand that got it named to TIME's World's Best Brands. They designed the identity for Ramp, now valued at $32B. They helped Archer land a $1B United Airlines order.
The throughline is a discipline Red Antler developed into something close to a framework: start from genuine consumer insight, build brand strategy around a clear differentiated position, then express it through identity, packaging, digital, and campaign as a single coherent system — not sequential deliverables. Emily Heyward wrote it all down in Obsessed: Building a Brand People Love from Day One, the 2020 Porchlight Marketing & Sales Book of the Year, which functions as both a manifesto and a business development tool.
Today the agency has grown well beyond its DTC roots. A dedicated pre-launch team still works with founders. But the Transform practice handles brand evolutions, campaigns, and incubation for established players — including McKinsey, the Webby Awards, and Cotopaxi. In 2024 Red Antler formalized a group structure, acquiring a stake in Fat Earth (performance marketing) and partnering with Wild Fruit (presentation design), giving clients a broader set of capabilities under one roof.
What Red Antler Does
Four integrated practice areas, covering the full brand lifecycle from pre-launch through sustained growth.
Foundation & Strategy
The diagnostic and directional layer — where most engagements begin.
Research · Naming · Brand Strategy · Brand Architecture · Change Management
Brand & Digital
Visual and verbal identity through to the complete digital and physical experience.
Visual Identity · Verbal Identity · Sonic Identity · User Experience Design · Visual Design · Packaging Design · Apps + Product Design · Physical Experience Design · Engineering & Technology
Advertising
Campaign strategy and execution across every channel, online and off.
Campaign Strategy · Channel & Comms Planning · Integrated Brand Campaigns · Experiential · Brand Films / Video · OOH/DOOH · Social · Direct Marketing · Influencer · Shopper
Media (via Fat Earth, part of Red Antler Group)
Performance marketing layered onto brand work.
Growth Strategy · Media Planning & Management · Lifecycle & CRM Marketing · Creative Strategy · Performance Creative · Landing Page Strategy & Design
Selected Work
A snapshot of recent named projects. Full case studies on the agency's site.
Casper
Brand Identity · Naming · Strategy
Named the company, built the brand, and helped position it as a lifestyle brand for the well-rested — driving $20M in revenue in year one and a subsequent public listing.
Allbirds
Brand Identity · Naming · Packaging
Named the company, wrote the messaging, and designed the now-iconic shoebox-cum-mailer packaging. Virtually the entire brand identity came from Red Antler.
Hinge
Brand Identity · Campaign
Transformed Hinge into the fastest-growing dating app — "designed to be deleted."
Ramp
Brand Identity · Strategy
Built the brand for the corporate card and spend management platform, now valued at $32B. Positioning: "Smart is the new platinum."
AllTrails
Brand Identity
Apple iPhone App of the Year.
Archer
Brand Identity
The electric air taxi startup that landed a $1B order from United Airlines.
McKinsey
Brand · Digital
Brand and digital work for the global management consultancy.
Cotopaxi
Brand Identity · Campaign
Full brand work for the outdoor gear company with a humanitarian mission.
Hire Red Antler If You Need…
- A pre-launch brand partner with a proven record of taking consumer companies from zero to category-defining — the methodology is the most road-tested in this space
- A studio that can run naming, strategy, identity, packaging, digital, and campaign as one integrated engagement rather than separate handoffs
- Startup-specific brand fluency: understanding of investor optics, DTC channel dynamics, launch sequencing, and what brand needs to do before revenue
- An expanding B2B practice: Red Antler increasingly applies its consumer-brand rigour to fintech, healthtech, and enterprise software
- A group that can connect brand into performance marketing and media through Fat Earth
Skip Red Antler If…
- You need a traditional enterprise rebrand with deep global rollout infrastructure — this is a startup-origin agency scaling up, not a Landor or Wolff Olins with 60 years of global network
- You want a purely strategic consulting engagement without the creative execution — Red Antler is a full-service creative company, not a strategy-only shop
- Your aesthetic vision is deliberately contrary to the clean, modern, consumer-forward style they helped define — the risk of looking like every other VC-backed brand is real and worth discussing at the outset
- You're working with a budget significantly below $20K
Independent Verification
Recognition
Fast Company Most Innovative Companies — Marketing & Advertising (2018) · Inc. Top 10 Entrepreneurs of the Decade (2019, founders) · Inc. Top Female Founders (Emily Heyward) · Entrepreneur's Most Powerful Women in Business (2019) · New York Design Awards — Gold (Brandless, 2017) · WARC Effective Content Strategy — Silver (Hinge, 2018)
Press
Fast Company · Inc. · Adweek · TechCrunch · Business of Fashion · Print Magazine
DesignRush
4.3 rating across 19 reviews. Team size listed as 100–249. Pricing listed as Inquire.
If Red Antler Isn't the Right Fit
Clay Global
Premium brand identity and digital product design for tech, fintech, and SaaS. Stronger when complex product UI and a conversion-focused website need to be built alongside the brand.
Together Agency
Research-led brand and product strategy for B2B tech companies — better suited when positioning needs to drive product adoption rather than consumer launch momentum.
Brightscout
B2B branding and web tied directly to product delivery. A stronger fit when the brief is market leadership for a platform or SaaS company, not a consumer launch.
Frequently Asked Questions
In 2007 in Brooklyn, New York, by Emily Heyward, JB Osborne, and Simon Endres — all coming out of traditional advertising (Saatchi & Saatchi). The explicit goal from day one was to work exclusively with startups and embed brand as a growth driver from before launch.
Formed in 2024, Red Antler Group is the parent structure that brings together Red Antler (brand and creative), Fat Earth (creative performance marketing and media), and Wild Fruit (presentation design for funds, founders, and B2B). It's an integrated offering for companies that need brand and growth working together.
Yes — they maintain a dedicated pre-launch team that works directly with founders. But the agency has significantly expanded into established companies seeking transformation or category leadership, with clients including McKinsey, Cotopaxi, the Webby Awards, and Supergoop!.
Red Antler doesn't publish rates publicly. Third-party sources suggest branding projects start around $20K, with full brand packages typically ranging $50K–$200K+. Given team size and seniority, expect the upper end of that range for full-scope engagements.
Consumer DTC (food, beverage, apparel, home, wellness), fintech and financial services (Ramp, Chime, Betterment), health and biotech, outdoor and lifestyle, and increasingly B2B software and enterprise.
Ready to see if Red Antler fits your project?
Visit the agency's site to view their full portfolio, or compare them against the rest of our top picks.