When we designed our first website, we never imagined writing a 16 year story.
But here we are.
250+ clients. 2 offices.
27 successful pitches and no more pitching.
4 adopted dogs.
50+ internships. 10 interns who keep in touch.
1 completely insane employee.
13 fortune 500 companies. 2 Unicorns. 1 Decacorn.
12,000 biryanis debated about. 3324 Biryanis ordered.
16 years of honest design.
A lifetime of incredible stories.
By the second year, we had our first retainer renewed and our first car that proudly shimmered under the golden sun.
We felt the need to build a process, something to follow, to make it easier.
We’ve built processes, only to laugh when we’ve had to crack it over and over and over.
Every project is different, every client is new and every brand carries its own soul.
Our job is to find that soul and give it a voice.
Maybe that is the process.
In 3 years, 3 people who we met at Collabera took us to 3 new companies.
It became the pattern of our growth story. Almost every client we worked with took us to their new workplace.
We realized that the work we were doing was starting to grow outside emails, phone calls and buildings.
Our work was finding a place in people’s hearts.
This, for us, was the clearest affirmation that we were building value.
“Let the lame games begin.”
Shady games with shadier rules, that we fight to win.
Pictionary with artists and cooking dumb charades, making something out of nothing and snooker cars.
Pencil sword fights & bucket the ball.
Making jungle stories with shadows on the wall.
Spin a stick around a ball in the air.
Balance a cup while swiveling in your chair.
Football fretting. Cricket betting.
High pitched arguments over game-team vetting.
Our lame games were always made in an instant.
They are memories of our happy people, who’ll never feel distant.
Two glasses clink in the air to celebrate 5 years.
One is half filled with Old Monk and other is brimming with Schweppes Tonic.
The lady with the tonic says, “It’s been good so far…”
“It could’ve been better..”, says the Old Monk.
A designer electrocutes a mosquito in the background as if it were a sign of good things to come.
As partners we’ve found that imperfect balance of being content while always burning for more. (the mosquito does not agree)
In our sixth year, we met a brand that was just an ambitious classroom idea. Slowly, we became an extension of their marketing team, shaping their communication and branding.
One Tuesday, they asked us to design graphics for their new office by Monday. We laughed because all we saw were cement walls and construction dust.
But by Monday, everything had changed: painted walls, carpets, a hundred people at work. That same energy propelled them from unknown to unicorn. Then, life happened.
The world saw their rise. The world saw their troubles. But we? We remember the people. The hunger, the drive, the belief that anything was possible.
Because in the end, that’s what lasts – not headlines, not valuations, but the people who made you believe. And for that, we’ll always be fans of Team Purple!
Somewhere in our seventh year, we decided that we should start making corporate films.
But who would give us work, we’d never done it before?
Tring! Tring! the next day my phone rings.
“Is this Purplemango….do you make corporate films?”
“Yes we do…” (maybe this is what they call destiny)
“That’s great. We’re looking to get a film made about our new facility. Is that something you can do?” (Still cannot believe this is happening)
“Yes we can…”
“Could you share some of your previous work with us?”
“Actually, you would be our first client” (long pause…..)
Our Technology adventure started with a deep-dive into IT services, soon we were creating stories about Big Data, Analytics & Machine Learning, Artificial Intelligence & Digital Transformation.
These became buzz words for the next decade.
There’s an illusion that creative ideas are entangled in long facial hair and copious cups of coffee.
But for us it has meant, understanding complex business concepts, sketching ideas and weaving stories on white sheets of paper: each to be delivered within a set time-line.
We don’t do the Smokes. We don’t do the Coffee.
There is one thing we do and that is Biriyani.
When you start a Creative Agency, you do it because you are the ‘creative kind’.
The odd balls, the crazy ones, the misfits and everything else Steve Jobs says you are.
But our journey has been accidentally different. We developed a rare and dangerous skill—Listening.
Listening to theories about debt management (riveting), the future of background verification (edge-of-the-seat stuff), and supply chain decision intelligence (hold your applause). Turns out, there are stories hiding in the least expected places, stories that need telling, and very few who can tell them with clarity and flair.
That’s our superpower. And that’s why corporate giants hang out with us, year after year, some for more than 10 years.
Once upon a Party at Purplemango
The party kicks off with everyone on the dance floor.
Newbie declines a beer, changes mind quickly: five minutes later, he’s spinning like a ceiling fan.
Quiet cats turn into tigers after a few shots.
5 bottles of vodka vanish in 30 minutes.
The account manager drunk-dials his girlfriend, sobbing.
The diligent designer heads home early, later found smiling on a neighbor’s terrace.
The introverted illustrator sleeps on his desk, hugging Raita, with a chicken leg in his jeans.
The partners observe, taking notes for stories that will last years.
The next day (Saturday) everyone returns, hungover but ready to clean up.
We don’t mind if things get dirty, they do, as long as you’re ready to clean up after, then it’s all good!
10 years….Cheers! Applause!! Koovikyooo!!!
It’s a good time to retrospect and pay respect to this time we’ve created at Purplemango. What have we learned from our client experiences?
January 2020: Some virus in China is making a lot of people sick!
March 2020: LOCKDOWN
Masks. Gloves. Sanitizers.
Anxious Eyes. Quarantines.
Breathlessness. Hospitalisations. Deaths.
How do you live when you’re afraid to breathe?
How do you work today when you don’t know if you’ll be alive tomorrow?
You hold each other.
At Purplemango we held each other during the pandemic. Really Close.
We lost a few accounts, but we made sure we didn’t lose our spirits.
Our pay packets got smaller, but our hearts grew bigger.
We understood what was truly important in our lives and we held on to it – really tight!
What to eat has always been a BIG question at Purplemango!
Working for a Food Brand has always been the dream.
And somewhere in the middle of an ordinary year, this dream became a reality.
EatFit walked into our life: it was love at first sight, we committed at first bite.
We were apprehensive at first, when we told you about all the things we couldn’t do.
But you said, ‘You tell us what you can do, we’ll figure out the rest together’
So far, it’s been like a marriage. (a good one)
We hope to grow old with you, and tell stories of how we learned on the job.
Because you believed in us. And all you need in life is for ONE person to believe in you.
Everything we do for you comes straight from the heart. Thank you Curefoods.
Lights, Camera… What Are We Doing?
Of all the wild things we imagined, debating shoes for Varun Dhawan or hairstyles for Mithila Palkar wasn’t one of them.
Somewhere between the lights, cameras, and absolutely unhinged questions, we had a realization, glamour wasn’t our chase.
The art of crafting a shoot from scratch was. So, we planned, scripted, styled, and directed. With Devdutt Padikkal, we spun stories around food and watched him devour them. With Nikhat Zareen, we built a Fruit Pop shoot that packed as much punch as she does—gloves on, game face ready.
With Mayank Agarwal and Ashwini Ponnappa, we orchestrated frames that blended power and poise, sweat and style.
We walked into this year wide-eyed, stumbled into a Vanity Van meant just for us and walked out with a playbook on how to own every frame we step into.
The Year We Became Instagram Gurus (And Almost Lost Our Sanity)
When our client asked us to handle their Instagram, we reluctantly said, “Sure!”, without realizing the madness ahead.
Cut to a few months later, We are juggling six different pages.
Shooting videos at the speed of light. Filming food, eating food, wondering if we had become food.
And then, one fine day, after finishing another transition, we had an existential question “Is this who we are now?”
That’s when we learned: The biggest wins sometimes come from knowing what NOT to do.
So, we stepped back. Handed over trends to the Gen-Z pros. Now?
We sip coffee, drop wisdom, and let them chase the trending audios.
No more Reels. No more ring lights. Just sanity and strategy.
AI entered our life like a ‘Bin Bulaye Mehmaan’ (uninvited guest)
We weren’t sure why they turned up, what their intentions were or how long they planned to stay.
Obviously it wasn’t a comfortable situation.
They started helping out right away, picking up tiring tasks and work suddenly got easier and faster. (we’re not happy to admit this)
Right now, we’re in the party phase, so we also gave them a room. (Since they don’t plan to leave, might as well)
But we’re wary, very wary, we know how these things pan out. We know that when things get ugly we won’t be able to ask them to just pack their bags and leave.
The current soundtrack to our life is ‘With or Without You’ by U2
So what happens next?….We don’t know….in fact nobody knows!
But if a worst case scenario presents itself, we’ll turn it around.
Because that’s what we do best, turn unpredictable situations into unconventional stories.
And in this one, we see ourselves living Happily Ever After. (with or without AI)
…to every designer for spending a part of their life with us.
…to every intern for teaching us something new.
…to every client for challenging us to get better at what we do.
…to Phoebe for bringing us so much joy.
…to our parents for accepting our insanity.
& to our spouses for continuing to live with it.
Kabira & Yuki, Everything we do is for the two of you.
Love, The Purplemango People
When we designed our first website, we never imagined writing a 16 year story.
But here we are.
250+ clients. 2 offices.
27 successful pitches and no more pitching.
4 adopted dogs.
50+ internships. 10 interns who keep in touch.
1 completely insane employee.
13 fortune 500 companies. 2 Unicorns. 1 Decacorn.
12,000 biryanis debated about. 3324 Biryanis ordered.
16 years of honest design.
A lifetime of incredible stories.
By the second year, we had our first retainer renewed and our first car that proudly shimmered under the golden sun.
We felt the need to build a process, something to follow, to make it easier.
We’ve built processes, only to laugh when we’ve had to crack it over and over and over.
Every project is different, every client is new and every brand carries its own soul.
Our job is to find that soul and give it a voice.
Maybe that is the process.
In 3 years, 3 people who we met at Collabera took us to 3 new companies.
It became the pattern of our growth story. Almost every client we worked with took us to their new workplace.
We realized that the work we were doing was starting to grow outside emails, phone calls and buildings.
Our work was finding a place in people’s hearts.
This, for us, was the clearest affirmation that we were building value.
“Let the lame games begin.”
Shady games with shadier rules, that we fight to win.
Pictionary with artists and cooking dumb charades, making something out of nothing and snooker cars.
Pencil sword fights & bucket the ball.
Making jungle stories with shadows on the wall.
Spin a stick around a ball in the air.
Balance a cup while swiveling in your chair.
Football fretting. Cricket betting.
High pitched arguments over game-team vetting.
Our lame games were always made in an instant.
They are memories of our happy people, who’ll never feel distant.
Two glasses clink in the air to celebrate 5 years.
One is half filled with Old Monk and other is brimming with Schweppes Tonic.
The lady with the tonic says, “It’s been good so far…”
“It could’ve been better..”, says the Old Monk.
A designer electrocutes a mosquito in the background as if it were a sign of good things to come.
As partners we’ve found that imperfect balance of being content while always burning for more. (the mosquito does not agree)
In our sixth year, we met a brand that was just an ambitious classroom idea. Slowly, we became an extension of their marketing team, shaping their communication and branding.
One Tuesday, they asked us to design graphics for their new office by Monday. We laughed because all we saw were cement walls and construction dust.
But by Monday, everything had changed: painted walls, carpets, a hundred people at work. That same energy propelled them from unknown to unicorn. Then, life happened.
The world saw their rise. The world saw their troubles. But we? We remember the people. The hunger, the drive, the belief that anything was possible.
Because in the end, that’s what lasts – not headlines, not valuations, but the people who made you believe. And for that, we’ll always be fans of Team Purple!
Somewhere in our seventh year, we decided that we should start making corporate films.
But who would give us work, we’d never done it before?
Tring! Tring! the next day my phone rings.
“Is this Purplemango….do you make corporate films?”
“Yes we do…” (maybe this is what they call destiny)
“That’s great. We’re looking to get a film made about our new facility. Is that something you can do?” (Still cannot believe this is happening)
“Yes we can…”
“Could you share some of your previous work with us?”
“Actually, you would be our first client” (long pause…..)
Our Technology adventure started with a deep-dive into IT services, soon we were creating stories about Big Data, Analytics & Machine Learning, Artificial Intelligence & Digital Transformation.
These became buzz words for the next decade.
There’s an illusion that creative ideas are entangled in long facial hair and copious cups of coffee.
But for us it has meant, understanding complex business concepts, sketching ideas and weaving stories on white sheets of paper: each to be delivered within a set time-line.
We don’t do the Smokes. We don’t do the Coffee.
There is one thing we do and that is Biriyani.
When you start a Creative Agency, you do it because you are the ‘creative kind’.
The odd balls, the crazy ones, the misfits and everything else Steve Jobs says you are.
But our journey has been accidentally different. We developed a rare and dangerous skill—Listening.
Listening to theories about debt management (riveting), the future of background verification (edge-of-the-seat stuff), and supply chain decision intelligence (hold your applause). Turns out, there are stories hiding in the least expected places, stories that need telling, and very few who can tell them with clarity and flair.
That’s our superpower. And that’s why corporate giants hang out with us, year after year, some for more than 10 years.
Once upon a Party at Purplemango
The party kicks off with everyone on the dance floor.
Newbie declines a beer, changes mind quickly: five minutes later, he’s spinning like a ceiling fan.
Quiet cats turn into tigers after a few shots.
5 bottles of vodka vanish in 30 minutes.
The account manager drunk-dials his girlfriend, sobbing.
The diligent designer heads home early, later found smiling on a neighbor’s terrace.
The introverted illustrator sleeps on his desk, hugging Raita, with a chicken leg in his jeans.
The partners observe, taking notes for stories that will last years.
The next day (Saturday) everyone returns, hungover but ready to clean up.
We don’t mind if things get dirty, they do, as long as you’re ready to clean up after, then it’s all good!
10 years….Cheers! Applause!! Koovikyooo!!!
It’s a good time to retrospect and pay respect to this time we’ve created at Purplemango. What have we learned from our client experiences?
January 2020: Some virus in China is making a lot of people sick!
March 2020: LOCKDOWN
Masks. Gloves. Sanitizers.
Anxious Eyes. Quarantines.
Breathlessness. Hospitalisations. Deaths.
How do you live when you’re afraid to breathe?
How do you work today when you don’t know if you’ll be alive tomorrow?
You hold each other.
At Purplemango we held each other during the pandemic. Really Close.
We lost a few accounts, but we made sure we didn’t lose our spirits.
Our pay packets got smaller, but our hearts grew bigger.
We understood what was truly important in our lives and we held on to it – really tight!
What to eat has always been a BIG question at Purplemango!
Working for a Food Brand has always been the dream.
And somewhere in the middle of an ordinary year, this dream became a reality.
EatFit walked into our life: it was love at first sight, we committed at first bite.
We were apprehensive at first, when we told you about all the things we couldn’t do.
But you said, ‘You tell us what you can do, we’ll figure out the rest together’
So far, it’s been like a marriage. (a good one)
We hope to grow old with you, and tell stories of how we learned on the job.
Because you believed in us. And all you need in life is for ONE person to believe in you.
Everything we do for you comes straight from the heart. Thank you Curefoods.
Lights, Camera… What Are We Doing?
Of all the wild things we imagined, debating shoes for Varun Dhawan or hairstyles for Mithila Palkar wasn’t one of them.
Somewhere between the lights, cameras, and absolutely unhinged questions, we had a realization, glamour wasn’t our chase.
The art of crafting a shoot from scratch was. So, we planned, scripted, styled, and directed. With Devdutt Padikkal, we spun stories around food and watched him devour them. With Nikhat Zareen, we built a Fruit Pop shoot that packed as much punch as she does—gloves on, game face ready.
With Mayank Agarwal and Ashwini Ponnappa, we orchestrated frames that blended power and poise, sweat and style.
We walked into this year wide-eyed, stumbled into a Vanity Van meant just for us and walked out with a playbook on how to own every frame we step into.
The Year We Became Instagram Gurus (And Almost Lost Our Sanity)
When our client asked us to handle their Instagram, we reluctantly said, “Sure!”, without realizing the madness ahead.
Cut to a few months later, We are juggling six different pages.
Shooting videos at the speed of light. Filming food, eating food, wondering if we had become food.
And then, one fine day, after finishing another transition, we had an existential question “Is this who we are now?”
That’s when we learned: The biggest wins sometimes come from knowing what NOT to do.
So, we stepped back. Handed over trends to the Gen-Z pros. Now?
We sip coffee, drop wisdom, and let them chase the trending audios.
No more Reels. No more ring lights. Just sanity and strategy.
AI entered our life like a ‘Bin Bulaye Mehmaan’ (uninvited guest)
We weren’t sure why they turned up, what their intentions were or how long they planned to stay.
Obviously it wasn’t a comfortable situation.
They started helping out right away, picking up tiring tasks and work suddenly got easier and faster. (we’re not happy to admit this)
Right now, we’re in the party phase, so we also gave them a room. (Since they don’t plan to leave, might as well)
But we’re wary, very wary, we know how these things pan out. We know that when things get ugly we won’t be able to ask them to just pack their bags and leave.
The current soundtrack to our life is ‘With or Without You’ by U2
So what happens next?….We don’t know….in fact nobody knows!
But if a worst case scenario presents itself, we’ll turn it around.
Because that’s what we do best, turn unpredictable situations into unconventional stories.
And in this one, we see ourselves living Happily Ever After. (with or without AI)
…to every designer for spending a part of their life with us.
…to every intern for teaching us something new.
…to every client for challenging us to get better at what we do.
…to Phoebe for bringing us so much joy.
…to our parents for accepting our insanity.
& to our spouses for continuing to live with it.
Kabira & Yuki, Everything we do is for the two of you.
Love, The Purplemango People
Purplemango India #497, 16th Cross, 3rd A Main, 6th Sector, HSR Layout, Bangalore - 560102
