Primus Nair ECD at BBDO Singapore and head of jury for Crowbar’s Branding on his success story

How Primus Nair, Executive Creative Director at BBDO Singapore and Head of Jury (Branding) for the Singapore Crowbar student awards, turned his career from rags to riches.

Hailing from a land far, far away (Malaysia), Primus Nair, head of the Branding jury for this year’s Crowbar Awards, didn’t exactly start his career with his dream job. “I began my working life as a mechanic. I was simply horrible at it; I knew I had to find something else. Fast.”

Nair began his job hunt armed with hope and an open mind. He landed several other professions but they weren’t what he had in mind either. “Once, I got a job as a janitor. It’s safe to say I didn’t enjoy it very much. Miraculously, I even scored a gig as a department mall Santa Claus. I guess you can say that the children were very forgiving.”

But fortunately, Nair finally found his magic carpet ride into his dream industry. “One day, I decided to enrol for a design course. This led me to an internship in Saatchi and Saatchi as a designer. Later, I pursued a career in copywriting and 13 years later, became the ECD of BBDO Singapore.”

Nair led the agency to win multiple awards and earned the “Agency of the Year” title twice in a row, with works even appearing in the Guinness Book of Records.

The Branding category is a new discipline in this year’s Crowbar Awards. Joining Nair at the jury table are his co-judges: Ann May Chua (BBDO Singapore (FLARE), Head of Production), Fiona Huang (BLK J, Account Director), Mindy Yap (Grab, Head of Regional Brand Marketing), Nikhil Panjwani (BBH, Creative Director), Nrusingha Chaoudhury (Facebook, Creative Director), Paolo Agulto (BLK J, Creative Group Head) and Michael D’Oliveiro (Hooq, Experienced Digital Business Leader).

The Crowbar Awards is organised by the Association of Accredited Advertising Agents Singapore (4As).

Call-for-entry starts from 19th June to 28th July 2017. The competition is open to students of all faculties in local and overseas institutions.