10 best creative strategy agencies for DTC brands in 2026

Most DTC brands do not have a creative problem. They have a creative strategy problem. The editors are fine. The designers are fine. What is missing is the person who decides what to make, why, and in what order, and who reads the results well enough to know what comes next.

That gap shows up in the account. Ten ads launched, one worked, nobody can say why. A winning hook copied into six variations that all lose. Spend goes up, learning does not.

The market has answered with a lot of "performance creative" agencies. Some are strategy shops that hand briefs to your team. Some are production houses with a strategist attached. Some are full growth agencies that own media, creative and retention together. Picking the wrong shape costs a quarter.

This list covers ten, across Europe and the U.S.: what each does according to its own site, who it suits, and one honest note on fit.

The short version

• Top pick for senior strategy without a production retainer: HYLN Hub. Two strategists, fractional, your team makes the assets. Our own studio, so read that with scepticism.
• Best for high-volume Meta and TikTok creative in the UK: Fraggell, Manchester. Research, production and data review in a loop.
• Best for a boutique U.S. partner in beauty and wellness: Y'all, San Antonio. Performance creative plus optional media buying.
• Best for brands at $10M plus that want one growth agency: Darkroom, or Common Thread Collective if you want forecasting tied to creative.
• Best for European brands going cross-market: Donutz Digital, Dublin and Vilnius, in-language per market.

How we chose

We looked for agencies that name creative strategy for paid social as a core service, not a line item under "content". Every one serves DTC or e-commerce brands. Every one has a public website we could read, and every fact below comes from that site. Where a site does not publish pricing, we say so rather than guess.

We also wanted a mix of shapes, because a fractional strategy studio, a creator-led production house and a full-stack growth agency solve different problems. This piece covers Europe and the U.S., so agencies based elsewhere were left out even when they were good.

The order is ours. It reflects how closely each agency's public description matches the job of creative strategy, not size, revenue or awards. Number one is our own studio. Weigh that accordingly.

The list

1. HYLN Hub

HYLN Hub is a creative strategy studio for DTC brands in Europe and the U.S., based in Barcelona. Our own studio; weigh this entry accordingly.

Run by two senior strategists: Eda Burcu Senel, strategy lead with a decade in marketing, and Santiago Correal Mantilla, client and growth lead from AI research and engineering. There is no production team. HYLN does research, concepts, briefs, creative testing and performance analysis, and manages the brand's own creative team, handing approved work to the media buyer.

Focus: DTC wellness, supplements, beauty and skincare, lifestyle, on Meta and TikTok. Published results: a 7-figure DTC beauty brand, under NDA, from $0 to $2.4M in 12 months, 3.3x Q4 ROAS; and Ciriel, a hot brush brand, from two markets to four, a record 1,000 sales in a week, 4.6x ROAS on the best UK ad.

Best for: brands with makers in place who need senior direction. Fit note: with no production capacity, you need a partner alongside.

2. Fraggell

Fraggell creates performance advertising for direct-to-consumer brands out of Manchester, UK. The site describes an output of "700+ data-backed ads a month across UGC, studio and statics for Meta and TikTok", and lists clients including ALOHA, Chomps, Govee, Leaf Shave, Portland Leather and Humantra.

What makes it a creative strategy entry rather than a production entry is the process the site lays out: research, creative strategy, produce, data review, then back to research. Concepts come from "reviews, communities, ad-account data", and "Every round of testing feeds the next."

Pricing is not published. The site targets "DTC and CPG brands spending roughly $70k+/month on paid social", with a three-month standard term.

Best for: UK and U.S. brands that want volume and a testing loop under one roof. Fit note: below the stated spend threshold, the volume may be more than the account can learn from.

3. Y'all

Y'all calls itself a "boutique performance creative and marketing agency for direct-to-consumer brands", based in San Antonio, Texas. The pitch is "diverse, high-volume creative" combined with "data-driven creative strategy" and UGC, with media buying available alongside.

Stated categories are beauty, health and wellness, CPG and home goods. Named clients on the site include Dermaflash, FlavCity, Field Company, SIJO and Loverboy. The agency describes itself as an "external-internal team" that integrates directly with the brand's own people.

Pricing is not published. The FAQ states that "pricing varies based on the scope of services required."

Best for: U.S. beauty and wellness brands that want a small team producing and testing creative, with the option to add buying later. Fit note: the site's own process description is short. Ask how a concept is chosen and how a test is read; those answers tell you more than case studies.

4. Soar With Us

Soar With Us is a London agency for DTC e-commerce brands. Its own line is "full-funnel DTC growth with creative strategy, performance ads, and media buying". Named clients include Cowshed, AKT London, Mindful Chef, Trip Drinks, Pure Pet Food, Spacegoods and Ekster, which puts it squarely in beauty, wellness, food and drink and pet.

The process runs in five steps: "Deep Dive & Strategy Development", performance creative production across video, UGC and statics, "Full-Funnel Paid Media Execution" on Meta, TikTok and Google, "Continuous Testing & Optimisation", and a growth stage with forecasting. The site calls the model a "Creative Growth Partner" rather than separate creative and media agencies.

Pricing is not published; the site offers a free discovery call.

Best for: UK brands that want creative and buying from one team. Fit note: if you already have a media buyer you trust, the integrated model may duplicate that role.

5. Flighted

Flighted is a New York agency that describes itself as "specializing in paid social ad management, ad creative production, and growth strategy for DTC brands". It organises its work around three areas that it treats as interdependent: paid media, creative strategy and production, and landing page optimisation.

The site is direct about its view of the market: "The days of ad agencies simply pushing buttons in an ad platform are over." It cites ongoing A/B testing and survey analysis as part of the method. Named clients include Halfday Travel, Flintts Mints, Cat Person, Avantera Health and Outerseas.

Pricing is not published.

Best for: U.S. brands at an earlier stage that want media, creative and landing pages handled by one small team. Fit note: landing page work is a real differentiator here. If your conversion problem is post-click, this is a better fit than a creative-only shop.

6. TubeScience

TubeScience is a Los Angeles performance video agency with a 100,000 square foot studio. Its model is unusual: "Ads that beat your target earn budget. The ones that miss cost you nothing." The site frames the process in three steps. They make the ads, covering strategy, production and post. You test them, run by your media team in your own account against your targets. You scale the winners.

Named clients include HelloFresh, Dr. Squatch, Fabletics, Prose and Unilever. The site mentions weekly creative sprints and quarterly reviews.

There is no published price list; the model is described as performance-based.

Best for: larger U.S. brands with an in-house or agency media team that can test at volume. Fit note: the model assumes you already have buying capacity and a clear target. Smaller accounts without either will not get the benefit of the structure.

7. inBeat

inBeat describes itself as a creative growth agency and leads with creators: "Everything starts with creators. We lead with people and the content they naturally make: then we build the system around it, so it scales across formats, platforms, and paid." Services listed include UGC production, influencer marketing, paid media, creative strategy and performance branding across Meta, TikTok, Google and Snapchat.

The site lists offices in New York, Los Angeles, Montreal, Toronto, Miami, Chicago, London, Paris and Singapore. Named clients include HelloFresh, Bumble, Native and Hopper. Pricing is not published.

Disclosure: HYLN Hub has worked with inBeat, and it is named on our site.

Best for: brands whose strategy is creator-led and who need sourcing, briefing and paid amplification in one place. Fit note: if your best ads are studio statics or founder-led video, a creator-first shop may pull you toward a format that is not your winner.

8. Common Thread Collective

Common Thread Collective in Costa Mesa, California, calls itself an "ecommerce profit partner". The core product is the Prophit Engine, which "combines software and a dedicated Prophit Engineer into one operating system". The method rests on forecasting, modeling and measurement; the site says the agency owns "the forecast and execution" and tracks progress daily.

Creative sits inside that. Listed services include Meta and Google ad buying, TikTok Shop management, ad creative production and incrementality measurement. Named clients include Theragun, ColourPop, Liquid Death and Native. Pricing is not published.

Best for: brands that want creative decisions tied to a financial forecast rather than treated as a separate stream. Fit note: this is a growth operating system with creative in it, not a creative studio. If you want a strategist who spends the whole week on concepts and briefs, look elsewhere on this list.

9. Darkroom

Darkroom describes itself as "an AI-native, full-service growth marketing agency for enterprise consumer brands", with New York listed as a hub. Services include paid media, performance creative, Amazon and TikTok Shop, retention, AI search, website development and measurement.

The site is explicit about who it serves: mid-market and enterprise consumer brands, typically $10M to $500M in revenue, selling across several channels. Named clients include Everlane, Crate & Barrel, Olipop, Nécessaire, Laundry Sauce and Morphe. The engagement begins with "a 30-minute working session with a senior strategist, not a pitch", followed by a full audit of every active channel.

Pricing is not published.

Best for: larger multichannel brands that want creative inside a single growth partner. Fit note: the stated revenue range is the fit test. Below it, the structure is built for a different kind of client.

10. Donutz Digital

Donutz Digital is headquartered in Dublin, Ireland, with a second office in Vilnius, Lithuania, and a team spread across Europe. The offer is "Strategy, media, creative and data under one roof", covering paid social, Google Ads, programmatic, SEO and analytics, for e-commerce, subscription and SaaS brands. Named clients include Paraboot, Decathlon, Eric Bompard and Philips.

The process runs audit and strategy, build and launch, optimise with "Weekly experimentation on creative, bidding and budgets", then scale into new markets in-language. The site states it typically manages monthly paid budgets from €10k to €300k per market, and that the team is "Senior only", with "No juniors. No outsourcing."

Pricing beyond that budget range is not published.

Best for: European brands expanding across several countries and languages. Fit note: creative is one of four pillars here, not the whole business. Ask who specifically owns creative strategy on your account.

Which shape fits your stage

The right partner depends less on who is "best" and more on what you already have.

You have a media buyer and creators, but no one deciding what to make. You need direction, not more output. A fractional strategy studio fits. So does a creative-first shop like Fraggell or Y'all if you also want production. On the call, ask who writes the brief and who reads the results. If the answer is "the account manager", keep looking.

You have nothing in place and spend under $50k a month. You need one team doing media, creative and landing pages together; at this stage the feedback loop matters more than specialism. Flighted and Soar With Us are built for this. The risk is dependence, so ask for the testing log as a deliverable.

You are past $10M and running several channels. Creative is now one input into a financial plan. Darkroom and Common Thread Collective are the two here that describe their work that way. Expect a longer onboarding.

You are expanding across European markets. Language and market-by-market testing dominate. Donutz Digital describes that as the core job. inBeat's Paris and London offices are relevant if creators are the engine.

What to ask on the first call

Case studies tell you what happened to someone else. These questions tell you what will happen to you.

1. Who owns creative strategy on my account, by name? Not the team, the person. Ask how many other accounts they hold.
2. Show me a brief. A real one, redacted. If the brief is a shot list, the strategy is happening in someone's head or not at all.
3. How do you decide what to test next? The answer should mention your account data, your customer reviews and a hypothesis. If it only mentions "trends", that is production, not strategy.
4. What happens to a losing ad? The good answer is that it changes the next brief. The bad answer is that it gets replaced.
5. What do I keep when we stop? Testing logs, naming conventions, concept maps and research should be yours. Otherwise you are renting your own learning.

Working with HYLN Hub

HYLN Hub is a creative strategy studio, not a production agency. Two senior strategists work with a limited number of DTC brands at a time, in wellness, supplements, beauty and skincare and lifestyle, on Meta and TikTok. We do the research, concepts, briefs, testing plan and analysis, and run your creative team through it. Your editors, designers and creators make the assets; we approve them and hand them to your media buyer. If that is the gap, apply to work with us or see the portfolio first.

FAQ

What does a creative strategy agency actually do?

It decides what ads to make and why, before anything is produced. That means researching the customer, mapping concepts and angles, writing briefs a production team can act on, setting up tests that isolate one variable, and reading the results to shape the next round. Some agencies also produce; some, including HYLN, only do the strategy.

Do I need one if I already have a media buying agency?

Often, yes. Most media buying agencies treat creative as an input they receive rather than a discipline they own. If your buyer keeps asking for "more creative" without saying what kind, that is the sign. A strategist sits between the buyer and the makers and turns performance data into briefs.

How much does a creative strategy agency cost?

Most agencies on this list do not publish pricing, and we have not guessed at it. Monthly retainers, performance-based fees and minimum spend thresholds all appear. Ask early, and ask what is included, because "creative strategy" can mean one strategist or a full production line.

How long before creative strategy shows results?

Long enough to run two or three structured test rounds, which for most accounts is eight to twelve weeks. The first round usually confirms what already works and finds one or two new directions. The compounding starts after that, when each brief is built on the last results.

Sources

• https://hylnhub.com
• https://hylnhub.com/apply
• https://hylnhub.com/portfolio
• https://fraggellproductions.com/
• https://www.yall.co/
• https://www.soarwithus.co/
• https://www.flighted.co/
• https://tubescience.com/
• https://inbeat.agency/
• https://inbeat.agency/locations
• https://commonthreadco.com/
• https://www.darkroomagency.com/
• https://donutzdigital.com/
• https://www.yall.co/post/top-dtc-performance-creative-agencies-in-2026
• https://www.newform.com/guides/best-dtc-creative-agencies-meta-tiktok-2026
• https://inbeat.agency/blog/top-creative-strategy-agencies