Our Success Story
To understand our multi-layered journey, we should start at the beginning.
Our name has two origins: the first is Conté crayons, a drawing medium invented by Nicolas-Jacques Conte. Conte crayons are made of pigments and a clay-like substance and are popular for formal sketches and drawings. Conte is said to derive from the French word conter, which means “to relate” and is also a French word for
…short literary compositions.”
This shows that we have built our reputation not only by focusing on the creative areas of content creation and brand development, or fostering relationships between brand owners and creatives, but also through the art of storytelling and communicating a brand’s vision.
Conté Africa started as a publishing company. We were founded in 2015 and published our first Conté Magazine that same year. We built relationships and partnerships with numerous designers, animators, illustrators, painters, jewellery designers, architects, draughtsmen, creative writers, photographers and many more. In the early years, we worked with and showcased creatives across Africa. We quickly became the mobile creative hub for Africa, putting the African creative scene centre stage. Conté Magazine was distributed in South Africa, Kenya, Ghana, New York, Los Angeles, Central London and Brighton and Hove, UK. We had partnerships with brands such as 1:54 Contemporary African Art Fair, Gallery of African Art (GAFRA), O.N.K.A gallery, Sony Mobile, Hollard Insurance, Business and Arts South Africa, BASA and finally Parsons the New School for Design.
Over time, we made a name for ourselves in the social impact and NPO sector and quickly turned to our strengths as we shifted our focus to brand development. Today we are a thriving brand strategy agency. We have actively mentored about 40% of the creatives we have featured, strategically partnering them with industry leaders and global brands like Rolls Royce and Global Citizen. These partnerships have led to paid opportunities such as campaigns, projects, jobs and commissioned work. All of this has led to the building of a database of 800 people hosting creatives, teams, non-profits and foundations across the African region. These include Jozihub, Micasa Music Group, Enhle Cares Foundation, House of Mandela, Nozala Trust, Africa Rising and many others.
Oboitshepo Tladi
Oboitshepo Tladi is a qualified linguist, who completed her Masters in Applied Linguistics at Rhodes University. She is a freelance editor, writer, and content creator. She has experience reviewing language policies, editing books and online articles for corporations, writing articles for Seele Magazine, as well as copywriting for product labels.
