Whitewater Creative

Introduction

Under the stewardship of owner Andy Connacher, Bury St Edmunds graphic design agency Whitewater Creative have been growing steadily since launching 30 years ago.

In April 2024, he moved Whitewater’s banking over to Allica Bank. The business now enjoys a top-tier savings rate on their instant access savings. But what Andy most appreciates is the dedicated support of his relationship manager, Emily.

Who are Whitewater Creative?

Whitewater Creative are a graphic design and branding agency in Bury St Edmunds specialising in design for the beauty and food & drink sectors. Owned and run Bury St Edmunds local Andy Connacher, it has been in business for 30 years.

Whitewater’s background is in working with international cosmetics brands, helping them to adapt their global concepts to the UK market across digital and physical media and packaging. Its clients also include UK-wide pub and restaurant chains and a range of local businesses.

The story

Whitewater has steadily grown in its 30 years of business under Andy’s leadership. Launching initially with a focus on beauty and cosmetics, it has steadily grown its sectors of expertise, now boasting a well-known roster of clients, including global beauty brands and UK-wide pub and restaurant chains. It has also more recently began doing branding work for a wider array of local businesses.

The Bury St Edmunds community is very important to Whitewater, Andy said. “We get a lot of our new talent from a local college, while we also have a collaboration space next door that brings in lots of local freelancers that we work with, too. This all helps give us fresh ideas and ways of working. For example, we’re able to use AI now to tackle some of those monotonous tasks, freeing up the team to focus on the creative side. We wouldn’t have been able to do this a few years ago."

Alongside Whitewater’s creative talent, Andy says their transparency is also one of the reasons they have such a loyal client base. “We work to rate card so everybody knows exactly what the pricing’s going to be and there’s no hidden extras.”

How Allica Bank helped

One day in April, Andy found himself at a Bury St Edmunds business leaders lunch sat next to Emily Hopkins, a local relationship manager for Allica Bank. Based nearby, Emily has been supporting businesses in East Anglia for 20 years.

“We got talking and Emily mentioned Allica could offer a really good instant access savings rate alongside a personal relationship manager,” Andy said. “I just thought this sounds like a no-brainer. That’s where we should be.”

Andy said he knew instantly he’d made the right choice when it came to his experience opening the account. “We had a problem with our largest client, who insisted that they needed a letter directly from our new bank to confirm we’d actually moved banks. All I had to do was copy in Emily to the email chain and it was sorted in 48 hours.”

“It’s the sort of thing that would have taken weeks with our previous bank. For me, this is the main benefit of working with Allica and having a relationship manager: not having to deal with a call centre.”

Once his new bank account was opened, Andy was especially pleased with being able to earn a decent return on his company cash. “It’s money that would otherwise be earning nothing with another bank. So I thought why not put it to work?”

What’s next for Whitewater?

“Whitewater is growing nicely at the moment,” Andy said. “We’ve brought on three new skincare brands in the last few months and are pushing hard to get another big player in the hospitality market.” Andy is also planning to grow the size of both their marketing and sales teams to continue to build demand.

He is also looking forward to working together with Allica and Emily, and making the most of having a dedicated relationship manager. “Being with Allica has definitely saved me personally a lot of time,” he said.

“Ultimately, why would you be with a business bank that doesn’t give you a personal relationship manager? And why would you be with a business bank that doesn’t pay interest? Moving to Allica was a no-brainer.”