SA1: Marketing agency that started as a one-woman business moves into the J-Shed after Workplace of the Year win

A Swansea digital marketing agency that began as a one-person business in 2018 has signed for Unit 6 at the J-Shed in SA1, days after being named Workplace of the Year at the South Wales Business Awards.

AD Marketing runs search engine optimisation and paid search campaigns for clients across Wales and the UK. Founder Alix Charles set it up and ran it alone before the team grew.

The firm says it is taking on staff and new clients and needed more room.

Charles, its managing director, said: “To win Workplace of the Year and then sign for our new office within days of each other made September a pretty special month for us.”

From grain warehouse to agency office

The J-Shed was built in 1895 as a grain warehouse beside the Prince of Wales Dock and is Grade II listed, the last survivor of the row of dockside sheds. It now holds offices, businesses and leisure units.

The lease was handled by RJ Chartered Surveyors, whose associate director James Smale-Davies is pictured with Charles at the new unit.

Charles said the firm had wanted “somewhere that reflected where AD Marketing is heading”. She added: “J-Shed has so much history and character, but it also sits in an area full of businesses that are growing, innovating and investing in Swansea.”

“Winning the award and securing J-Shed within the same week felt like two very clear signs that we are moving in the right direction,” she said.

‘If you invest in good people, they grow with the business’

The company puts the award down to how it treats its staff, promoting from within and involving the team in decisions about where the firm goes next.

“We have always believed that if you invest in good people, give them opportunities and listen to them, they will grow with the business,” Charles said.

“What we have created here hasn’t come from copying somebody else’s idea of what a good workplace should look like. It has developed around our team, what motivates them and what helps them do their best work.”

The agency made Faith in Families its charity of the year in 2025, setting out to raise £10,000 by offering its SEO and paid search training courses free in return for donations to the charity.

The firm has not put a figure on the size of the team or the number of new roles.

Author

Kit Peters

Kit Peters is a journalist and the editor of Swansea Bay News, covering Swansea, Neath Port Talbot and Carmarthenshire since 2020.