Oliver Tomlinson, founder of TDL-Creative, shares his journey of moving from Wales to Sydney, the realities of taking a leap into the unknown, and how our employee-owners were involved in the process of launching TDL APAC.
New Year, New Start
I honestly can’t remember much about New Year’s Eve in 2025; not due to excess drinking, but mainly because I was tossing and turning in a restless sleep. Now, this isn’t particularly different to other years, especially with two young kids and the stresses of middle age, but this time was different.
This New Year’s I was thousands of feet up, somewhere above the Indian Ocean, heading East, with my wife and two children around me on a one–way ticket to Sydney! We were about to start a new chapter of our lives, with just the luggage in the hold beneath us, and a few bits of printed paper saying we could stay in Australia for the next three years.
We arrived here on 1st January and it’s been a whirlwind of emotions, admin, fun, and tears!
– Oliver Tomlinson, MD & Founder of TDL-Creative
The seed of an idea
Back in May 2025, I found myself helping a TDL client in Sydney. I’d never been to Australia before and was surprised when I got the all-important green light from my wife to help out on a bid over there, leaving her to look after the kids, sheep, dog, cat and birds of prey on our smallholding – I was going to need to buy some serious duty-free on the way home! But this trip was the catalyst for major life decisions and upheaval over the following six months.
I loved being back at the ‘coal face’ of bidding, helping on-site to facilitate a great working relationship between our client and the TDL team back in the UK. Hours were long, but that never matters when you’re part of a great team, all striving to get the best bid out of the door. It was also refreshing to work with a client team embedded in an office, coming up with solutions there and then, eating and socialising together – it was like the ‘good ol’ days of bidding in the UK! I’ve started a post about on-site bidding, so look out for some more thoughts on that one coming soon.
“I loved being back at the ‘coal face’ of bidding, helping on-site to facilitate a great working relationship between our client and the TDL team back in the UK”
– Oliver Tomlinson, MD & Founder of TDL-Creative
However, the main thing that struck me was the lifestyle in Sydney. The weather, beautiful surroundings and café culture was great, but the best thing was all the people outside enjoying life. Seeing all the amazing outdoor facilities, especially around sport, got me thinking about my own children, and the stark contrast between Sydney and the remote Welsh hills and cash-strapped Councils we were used to back at home.
I returned buzzing, and carefully aired the idea with my family; ‘what if we moved to Sydney?’. I knew it was crazy; I’d seen barely a smidge of Sydney, and nothing of the rest of Australia, but it had a pull I’ve not felt before. Our boys, aged 8 and 10, were surprisingly fine with the idea (highlighting the resilience of children, I suppose), and my wife seemed keen too – we both agreed that life is too short to let a good opportunity slip by. Let’s pop the house on the market and see how things go. After all, the housing market is super slow, so we’ll have time to make plans. The house goes on the market and sells in a weekend! Oh, we’d better crack on then, and I guess my wife and family should probably visit Australia!
From idea to reality
My thinking was I’d just set up another branch of TDL in Sydney, surely that’s not going to be too difficult? But this was a big decision, and now the agency I’d originally founded in 2011 was 100% employee-owned, this couldn’t be one of my crazy in-the-moment ideas. This was something I needed the input and backing from the whole TDL team.
We structured a clear process of developing the idea based on a thorough business plan. This business plan may have originally been required for the visa, but it soon turned into a live document, being scrutinised by the team, with thoughts inputted, discussed, revised and ticked off as a group rather than an individual. Sometimes it was hard, but it was a great process to go through and gave me a sense of responsibility of making the right decisions for the team, not just for myself as a director.
As TDL is a 100% employee-owned business, I needed the input and backing from the whole team.
– Oliver Tomlinson, MD & Founder of TDL-Creative
Of course, there were a lot of things we couldn’t answer straight away; we’d have to just give it a go and de-risk by having fall-back plans; this wasn’t just a mantra for the business opportunity, but for me and my family too. In a way, it felt easier on the business side as we already had clients in Australia, or divisions there of our UK clients, and it looked like there was an appetite for our approach to design, especially in the bid sector. The questions around the family and the people we’d be leaving behind were a harder one to plan for. What would it feel like, selling all our stuff and living on the other side of the world? The TDL team had signed it off and we’d engaged with a company to help us with the visa applications, but my wife and the boys had never been to Australia – it was time for a little tester.
The big test
Finding somewhere in Sydney to live and a new school for our children was not going to be achievable from the UK; combined with the fact that my family had never been to Australia, all meant we had to get over there quick snap. We booked tickets and accommodation for the whole of November and got the blessing from the boys’ school to take them out. Due to their ages, it was a bit ‘now or never’, as I’m sure things would have got harder if they were in high school. We now didn’t own a home and were living out of bags, but it was good preparation for scaling back our lives to give us the flexibility to focus on the important things – we became a strong family unit, adventure-ready!
However, things did not get off to the best start in my ‘sell the dream to my family’ month. The jet lag absolutely ruined the boys for the first week and was still impacting the youngest till almost the end of the month. Our month included some terrible weather, countless stressful house rental viewings, six school visits, a terrible Airbnb and an incident with a stingray! But the positives outweighed the negatives (luckily), and we picked our house and school in the last week.
A key component of this month was just focusing on one area of Sydney to avoid being overwhelmed with choice. According to Google, London’s population is around 9 million compared to Sydney’s 5.4 million, but the big difference is how that population is spread out. Greater London is densely packed, whereas Greater Sydney’s geographic spread is nearly 8 times bigger. I was lucky to have several ex-Amey colleagues who’d set up in Sydney’s Sutherland Shire in the south, commonly referred to as ‘The Shire’. It was here that I spent most of my time in May, so it was here that we focused our searches. It was an hour on the train into the Central Business District (CBD), but it had everything we needed, and most importantly, a small group of connections. I honestly don’t think we’d have taken the leap if it weren’t for our existing friends in Sydney.
A month in
As I’m writing this, we’ve been here for exactly four weeks, and I have to keep pinching myself to believe we’ve actually done it. Just six months between a crazy idea and actually living on the other side of the world.
It’s been a very steep learning curve, though, especially with all the life and business setup admin – two things I’d somewhat underestimated! In three days, our children start at their new school and another milestone will be hit. The new company setup is very nearly done, but opening the business bank account is somewhat tricky, especially as an Employee Ownership Trust doesn’t really seem to be a thing over here in Australia. I’ve had a few conversations needing to explain how the new company isn’t owned by anyone, and that it’s a trust working on behalf of its employees – potentially an interesting topic at the local Chamber of Commerce?
I’m lucky to have the capability and experience of the TDL team back in the UK to call on when needed.
– Oliver Tomlinson, MD & Founder of TDL-Creative
I’m currently working on a small bid project, but really looking forward to starting from the ground up again, just like the early days of TDL back in the UK in 2011. I might be a ‘one man band’ over here right now, but I’m lucky to have the capability and experience of the TDL team back in the UK to call on when needed. Everything is set, so it’s time to see how things develop over the next few months – and hopefully years. Watch this space!
Key learnings so far
Over the last few months, I’ve been logging some notes from our experience of moving from the UK and setting up a new company in Australia. Some are personal, some are practical, but hopefully, there might be a couple of takeaways for anyone else embarking on a life adventure like ours.
- No regrets: If there’s an interesting opportunity, weigh up the risks and go for it! It was sad hearing so many people back in the UK say, ‘oh I wish I’d have done it when I had the chance’.
- Life’s adventure: Right from the start, we and others have called this an ‘adventure’ and I think it’s a great word for it. Adventures need planning, you’ve got to go with the flow, riding the ups and downs. Adventures are often trips into the unknown. It’s going to be a memorable journey and one we will all learn from as a family unit, and if it all goes wrong then we go back home – simple!
- Visa empowerment: Waiting for the visa was a stressful period that felt very much out of our hands, but when we were approved it gave me a real sense of empowerment. After all the relentless box ticking, research, proposals, packing, sorting, downsizing and continual goodbyes, we eventually got there; with a lot of hard work, we could make things happen, and how lucky we were to be in a position to do it.
- Emotion vs process: It struck home what a big deal this was when the boys had their last day of school – there were messages, cards, gifts and tears everywhere, and it dawned on me that I’d been so wrapped up in the process I hadn’t given the emotional impact enough attention.
- Company admin: A lot of the focus was on the family first, i.e. selling the dream, finding somewhere to live, and schooling for the children, but there were a number of complications setting up a subsidiary company in Australia, even with some great external help. It sometimes felt you’d get somewhere on one thing, but that would unearth a different complication somewhere else. Not knowing how the system works, you have to rely on and trust recommendations from other people.
- Soak up UK memories: During the last few weeks within the UK, I found myself mentally logging and feeling very present in the moment, noting all the minute details of the last scenes, especially with the goodbyes. Pausing to see the London Eye at night, frosty sunny morning runs with our dog, the smell of the local pub, Autumn, all got logged and remembered. Of course, we will be back in the UK at some stage, but it was interesting how my brain wanted to pause on certain things when it knew it wasn’t going to see or experience them for a while.
- Children are resilient: I’ve felt such pride for how adaptable and resilient our boys have been during the whole process. As a parent, you often worry or make decisions around what you think is best for your children; you worry they won’t be able to adapt, they won’t like the change, they won’t make new friends, etc. Maybe I’m lucky, maybe it’s their younger pre-teen age, but they seem to have dealt with a lot of things a lot better than my wife and I! I’d like to think this adventure will have a long-lasting influence on their own aspirations and approach to opportunity in the future.
- Overlooked practicalities: I went to my first on-site client meeting this week, which made me think I still have so much to learn – I had no idea what to wear! After a couple of weeks working from home in shorts, t-shirt and flip-flops (I was going to write ‘thongs’ but thought the UK readers might get confused and have a very different vision of my work attire!), I needed to dress up for an office meeting in the city centre. The heat was the factor here, with UK clothes seeming to be thicker than Australian ones; should I wear a polo, short-sleeved shirt, or long-sleeved shirt? Combine this with a walk or cycle to the bus stop, and then a train journey, and you can imagine the difficulties. Anyway, a trip to the shopping mall is required this weekend!
Finishing with a “thank you”
To wrap up this mini essay, it’s important for me to say a few thank yous:
- To my family: for the belief in this crazy idea and the willingness to give it a go.
- To the TDL team: for the trust, challenge and enthusiasm in allowing me to set up another TDL on the other side of the world.
- To my friends: Especially my ex-Amey colleagues and new work friends in Australia for the support, confidence and essential ‘local knowledge’.
- To our advisors: for all the practical elements, the teams at ASG Visa and ABN Australia, and Paul Wright of the Australian British Chamber of Commerce.