Cool & foxy foursome

In denial with summer internships and with their common inclination towards marketing, four 19-year-olds, Harshil Karia, Paritosh Ajmera, Pratik Gupta and Suveer Bajaj, had ditched a Goa trip to start a company of their own.

Six years later, FoxyMoron has a value of over Rs 15 crore and is the recipient of the Shorty Industry Award for its Annual Digital Strategy for campaigns in India for Maybelline, New York (being the only Indian agency to have won so). They were also declared as the agency of the year by Pitch magazine. And the best part is that their 150 employees are mostly youngsters (as a rule).  

As many would wonder, and we did too, what does FoxyMoron mean? Harshil answers, “When we started thinking of names, we wanted something quirky that would set us apart. The name FoxyMoron too was on impulse. It was only later we realised that the word ‘oxymoron’ lies within the name, that’s where we play with words to say ‘be smart and stupid, be foxy’.”

As teenagers with their own start-up, they did have to find their way through the marketing maze. “From begging our landlord not to throw us out to having a tough time convincing clients that some 20-year-olds could work for them, we were just running helter skelter in the industry. At that time, social media was not a popular concept. We also had to educate our clients  on what digital media is,” says Suveer.

They believed in the influential power of social networking websites long before its craze hit the country. “I have been coding and designing websites for as long as I can remember. I guess it was our passion and a fearless attitude that did the trick,” adds Paritosh.

Working out of a small apartment in Mumbai, their first client was a dance academy. Two months into the job, they had a small, but their own, office in Mumbai. Their big break came when they were approached by PVR Cinemas for the promotion of Twilight in India, followed by Cadbury’s, which Harshil remembers happened after chasing them for nine months.

Surpassing self-doubt, FoxyMoron, today, has handled brands like Garnier Fructis, L’Oreal, Maybelline and many others. They have doubled their employee strength twice in two years and have even opened an office in Delhi. But achievement for them is, as Harshil explains, “the ability to keep going”.

“We have lived and thrived in the medium and our aim is to try and create a world class digital advertising agency.”

And while many would think the opposite, it was actually their “young age” that worked for them. Giving a word of advice to all other young entrepreneurs, Pratik says, “Don’t get scared to start. There is nothing better than experience. Sometimes, it is the failure that is a stepping stone to success.”

For the four, FoxyMoron is now much more than just a company, as Pratik says, “FoxyMoron is everything that I am.”