Digital agency Grapefruit celebrates 25 years. It started from Iași in the age of the fax and has reached hundreds of projects in many countries, including Germany, Great Britain or Switzerland. In 2024, the agency launched Povelia, the first AI-powered children’s audio story app.
Grapefruit was founded in November 1999, and in the 2000s it already became the most awarded agency in Romania with 12 international awards won in 6 years. Among them are Texas Interactive Media Achievement Awards (USA, 2003) for Outstanding Achievement, Identity: Best of The Best (Russia, 2007) with 4 awards or Pentawards (France, 2007, 2008, 2011) with 3 Silver Awards, but also Incheon (South Korea, 2006).
To these are added those from 2024:
- International Business Brilliance Award (Marea Britanie): Brand Brilliance la categoria Small Business și Gold Award winner la categoria CEO of the Year (Georgiana Dragomir)
- Global Recognition Award: Award for the entire activity
- Business Elite Awards – Top 40 under 40: Georgiana Dragomir (CEO); included in the international top along with other leaders from all over Europe
- Innovation & Excellence Awards: Distincția Web Development Agency of the Year – Romania
In Romania, the agency stood out with several awards. Created the first automotive e-commerce for Dacia Renault for configuring and purchasing cars. Developed and launched the Digital Evaluator for assessing the digital maturity of companies, approved by the European Union Commission for use in eDIH practice (digital innovation centers). The app was awarded “Digital Platform Excellence” at the Factory 4.0 Digital Excellence & Awards (2023).
The newest project is Povelia, the first app that supports children’s education by using AI to generate personalized audio stories based on their name, age and the lesson they need to learn.
In 2012, Grapefruit was one of the first agencies in Romania to identify the huge potential in UI/UX. That was the moment of transformation from a branding agency to one focused on digital and UI/UX design.
“Grapefruit started when printers and fax machines were essential, telephones were landlines, internal communication meant face-to-face discussions, and customer confirmations were given by physical signature. We are now in the time where we collaborate through Google Docs, Slack, email is more important than ever, we integrate AI solutions, and customers check out materials through a link.
We also caught the period of the pandemic, when we had to quickly rethink the way of working, implement the work-from-home system, reorganize the hiring process and develop back-up plans for any unforeseen situation – all this at the same time.
A lot has happened in this quarter of a century, and we’re glad to have kept up with the changes and even contributed to innovation in the industry. We did not intend this. Grapefruit’s goal has been one from the beginning: to be a reliable partner. We approach collaborations with a long-term mindset and to help our partners bring their projects to life, grow and innovate. That’s how we ended up today with clients with whom we’ve been collaborating for almost two decades,” he declared Georgiana DragomirCEO Grapefruit.
25 years of Grapefruit in projects, transformations and industry impact
In his 25 years of activity, he has worked with some of the largest companies in over 10 industries such as telecom, banking, automotive, pharmaceutical and FMCG. Since collaborating with Connex in 2001, it has reached names such as Philip Morris, Nestlé, Nestlé Infant, Dacia Renault, Garanti BBVA, IQOS, NAOS-Bioderma, BCR, E.ON, CEZ, ING, Noriel and even UNTOLD.
Some of the largest projects carried out by Grapefruit for international companies:
- PPC: Redesign, SEO and help in the rebranding of all digital assets after the takeover of the ENEL Romania activity
- IQOS: Release of IQOS Club community builds, from loyalty platform to community platform
- genius: Creation of a unified brand strategy that encompasses 10 universities under one umbrella
- Dacia Renault: The launch of the first car e-commerce alongside Dacia Renault (he has been a customer for over 19 years)
- Nestlé Infant: Migration and content creation for Romania and 4 other countries: Croatia, Serbia, Bulgaria and Slovakia
Grapefruit’s portfolio includes more than 60 clients from various industries and has reached, in 25 years, more than 500 completed projects in 9 countries, including Germany, Switzerland, Great Britain, Greece and Middle Eastern countries.
Independent of this activity, the agency has contributed to the formation and development of two essential partnerships for the industry. the first – Digital Innovation Zone – is dedicated to digitization efforts in the North-Eastern region of Romania, and the second – ALL INDIE – aims to expand the range of services offered to customers.
Digital Innovation Zone is a European digital innovation hub (EDIH) and the only one in the NE region of Romania. The goal is to help SMEs and public institutions in production and health to start the digital transformation process. It offers courses to deepen digital skills, services such as the possibility to test technologies before investing, access to the national and European ecosystem to find a suitable partner and support in identifying the right funding sources for their needs.
Grapefruit is a co-founding member along with the Technical University “Gheorghe Asachi” from Iași (the project leader), the North-East Regional Development Agency, the Atelierul de Idei, the IMAGO-MOL Cluster, the Atelierul de Idei, Strongbytes and Iceberg.
ALL INDIE is an alliance of independent agencies, which share extensive experience in digital media, branding and data analysis, but also genuine entrepreneurial spirit with 100% Romanian capital. Together, the 6 agencies have extensive experience in over 30 industries and set a high standard of digital excellence.
Grapefruit is a co-founding member along with Rusu+Borțun, Brand Growers, Data Revolt, Daescu Bortun Olteanu and Public Relations People.
The team is indispensable to performance
Grapefruit’s aim to be a trusted partner is also reflected in the organizational culture. The agency has implemented several mechanisms to ensure good team cohesion and an efficient recruitment process. From the perspective of the organizational culture, it has positioned itself as a healthy and balanced workplace – a company of people, a place where they have a voice.
“We are proud that we managed to build a real organizational culture, not just a beautiful presentation and rich words about it. I have always encouraged colleagues to speak up when they sense an imbalance, want new opportunities or have ideas for improvement. And flexibility was a key aspect of how we managed our team’s work. When necessary and possible, we made adjustments to allow them to find balance in their daily lives.
We implemented special programs for parents, offered days off or weeks off as part of a reward system, and created transparent mechanisms for evaluating skills. We have always been open and transparent with our employees and we have encouraged them to be the same in their relationship with us”, he said But TeletinCOO Grapefruit.
In 2016, Anca Teletin implemented 3 changes to outline the organizational culture:
Team Happiness & Engagement – A centralized rating system through which employees rated the job on multiple levels. It helped tremendously in anticipating critical moments and giving enough time to fix them.
Seniority Principles – A system to increase transparency during evaluations, so that each team member is always aware of his progress and what he has to do, but also what are the activities and responsibilities necessary for promotion.
Recruitment in 7 stages – An extensive recruitment process to analyze the compatibility of people on all levels: soft skills, technical skills, psychological profile, etc. so that decisions are 100% informed when a new member joins the team.
A year later one of the boldest ideas was launched: programul Outgrow Yourself. Thus, each colleague had the chance to test the role of Team Leader for 6 months. Employees thus saw whether it suited them or not and had the opportunity to develop new skills.
“We were able to be a reliable partner for Grapefruit customers only because of the team. And in 2020 we had clear proof that what we built is solid. We have greatly adjusted and streamlined our way of working remotely. And when other companies were massively laying off people, we hired – from all cities, not just Bucharest and Iași – until we doubled the number of employees to be able to respond to the large number of requests for digital services. And we achieved an 85% increase in revenue over the previous year.
And 2023 was the year we started an intense activity to redefine the culture and values of Grapefruit together with a business consultant. Now, following all the analyses, we have rediscovered our DNA and we have a clear idea of what we are and what we want on this dimension,” he added But TeletinCOO Grapefruit.
Povelia, the product with AI foundation and human need
Povelia is the latest innovative product developed and launched by Grapefruit. It is also an example of how artificial intelligence can be used to bring technology closer to the educational and emotional needs of children and families.
The development team is already working on new features to improve the storytelling experience, including options to choose narrator voices and introducing new characters. At the same time, the interface will receive new elements of interactivity. The long-term plan is to launch Povelia internationally, with support for over 59 languages including English, Spanish, French, Italian, Portuguese, Russian, German, Japanese, Korean or Arabic.
“Artificial intelligence is becoming more and more integrated into various fields, but we believe that human input will remain essential in creating authentic and valuable digital experiences. We remain true to our principle «People, not jobs» and this motivates us to offer digital experiences that combine human creativity with technological innovation.
Grapefruit is celebrating 25 years and we know very well what transformations mean and the need to synchronize with them. We are ready to adopt technologies that bring real value and contribute to digitization without borders. We look forward to exploring new international projects and contributing to redefining the digital future for customers in Romania and around the world,” he said Georgiana DragomirCEO Grapefruit.
Source: www.iqads.ro
