“The Monkeys continue to define what an advertising agency can be.” That is not what The Monkeys say about themselves. It’s how a client sees the agency. David Waugh, marketing director, of Parmalat, to be precise.

Brian Walsh, executive director of television at Foxtel, adds this:

The Monkeys, begun by “an unholy trio at the vanguard of the new creatocracy,” a decade ago, is now an adland institution. But don’t let the word, “institution”, con you into thinking The Monkeys has settled into the advertising agency mould. It has no intention of doing that. Ever.

“The Monkeys have proven that the idea – a provocative one, a dangerous one, a disruptive notion – traverses whatever medium it needs to in order to get to its destination. It’s sneaky like that.”

The agency has made EOFYS part of the Australian vernacular (and made Foxtel happy during the 2008 recession), helped kids stave off the brain-dead corporate zombies they don’t want to become (and made Boost mobile happy), forcibly stocked convenience stores with Oak (and made Oak happy), made a coupon that was almost impossible for millennials to redeem (and made Oak even more happy) and rescued ex-pats so they wouldn’t lamb alone on Australia Day (and made the MLA happy while incensing vegans, which made new reporters ecstatic).

The Monkeys do weird and wonderful things to get brands noticed. And now a lot of those have been gathered together in a beautiful book, along with the weird and wonderful things they have made because they love making them, like the Mambo doco, Art Irritates Life, and a three-act play in a Portaloo.

…and an (irreverent but nonetheless, or perhaps because of that, insightful) interview about how all this magic and mayhem began 3.154e + 8 seconds ago with a pool of $30k, and what the founders, Justin Drape, Mark Green and Scott Nowell have been doing with it ever since.

What would they say if you came up to them and said, “I’m thinking about starting an agency?”

All three: DO IT.