Insights
delivers market research & insights to make your life easier, your decisions better and your impact felt.
Creative
creating new futures for brands, business and culture.
Digital
enable businesses and organisations with the digital foundations for growth in an ever-evolving digital world.
Reputation
offers corporate affairs, issues and crisis communications that helps organisations to build, maintain, protect and strengthen their reputation.
Amplify
An integrated PR and communications agency that helps brands stand out through strategic, creative and impactful storytelling.
Experience
connects people and brands with experiences and emotions.
project32
Invest in tomorrow's champions, today.
Make
creates emotive and authentic film and video content that wins hearts, engages minds and delivers results.
Asia
connects brands to growth opportunities and new audiences throughout Asia Pacific, delivering integrated marketing campaigns across all communications touch points.
CRNRSTONE
the foundation of credible insights and confident decision making.
We are here to make your life easier, your decisions better, and your impact felt.
We deliver market research that focuses on our clients’ first: designing bespoke, creative solutions for your insights needs.
Bastion Insights is an independent small to medium enterprise. We are a full-service consumer insights agency full of smart, driven, curious types.
We respond fast: to change, to problems, to implementing solutions. We truly love what we do, so we work hard to deliver great work.
Our Services
We help our clients to discover truths about their target audiences, and then to uncover ways of applying those insights in the context of what they need to achieve next.
Insights Communities
Consumer Insights
Social & Government
Cross-Cultural Insights
We are long-time experts in insights communities (since 2008!)
We design, manage and facilitate online communities of all shapes and sizes to ensure our clients are truly customer led.
Perfect for organisations wishing to undertake multiple research projects cost effectively and at speed.
There is no one size fits all approach. Our communities are designed to facilitate connection between our clients’ and their customers, stakeholders, employees, you name it!
Whilst an insights community gives you fast and cost-effective connection to consumers, there is no limit to the type of research activities you can do. It all depends on what YOU need.
Just some examples of our greatness…we have been running insights communities for several years with L'Oréal, Metcash, Transurban, Department of Transport & Planning and Medibank. We have also run countless other shorter communities (from a week to a year) for clients like Tourism Australia, Discovery Parks, Deakin Uni and Department of Health just to name a few.
We are a full-service research agency. That means we can do it all!
From traditional qualitative (focus groups, in-depth interviews) and quantitative work (market sizing, usage & attitudes studies, ad testing, segmentations, etc.)…to anything that we can think of to answer your objectives.
Everything we do is bespoke, no black boxes. Creative solutions is where we excel. We also love using clever tech and are always looking for new and better ways of getting to the heart of the matter. Of course, that includes using AI – and recognising both its power and its limitations.
We also add to our skills and what we can offer you by being part of a larger group of complementary marketing & communication agencies. That means we can think outside the ‘research’ boundaries of a problem / objective.
For example, we don’t just assess the most appropriate influencer from a consumer perspective, but we loop in experts who broker deals with influencers all day and every day – and just sit a few desks over.
Want to test a branding strategy with consumers? We can do that AND speak to our Bastion Creative colleagues to get their point of view as branding and advertising experts.
Bastion Insight's unparalleled strength in social and government research and evaluation services is marked by its robust experience and comprehensive understanding of the Australian federal and state government landscape.
With a proven track record of delivering tailor-made solutions to complex social and governance challenges, Bastion Insight stands out as a trusted partner for government entities seeking evidence-driven and effective strategies across communications, policy development & reform, and optimising program and service delivery.
Leveraging our significant expertise in public policy analysis, stakeholder engagement, and data-driven decision-making, our social and government practice fosters impactful collaborations between government bodies and the public, facilitating a seamless exchange of ideas and initiatives.
Our strong commitment to evidence-based approaches, combined with a keen understanding of the intricacies of the Australian political and social fabric, positions Bastion Insights as the foremost choice for government clients aiming to drive positive and sustainable societal change.
Note we can receive RFQs / be engaged through panels including:
• Management Advisory Services (MAS) Panel Standing Offer Notice SON3751667 (Federal clients)
• Social Research Services Panel 2016-2026 SON3352211 (Federal clients)
• Marketing Services Register (MSR) (Victorian clients).
The Cross-Cultural Insights team’s expertise focuses on cultural research and consulting, targeting the Culturally and Linguistically Diverse (CALD) communities residing in Australia. Through conducting research across Australia, the Asia-Pacific and beyond, we have developed strong expertise in social and commercial research and established a significant understanding of our diverse consumers and CALD communities in Australia. We have a deep understanding of cultural nuances and their impact on social behaviours, brand aspiration, purchase expectations, drivers and barriers, decision making, and the impacts of communication and marketing strategy planning.
We act as the bridge, helping you and your business to connect through differences.
Steven has 20+ years' experience as an insights professional and loves asking simple questions like 'why?'. Equally loves to ask 'why not'. Which makes for an interesting household with three children under 8! Steven is a natural leader of teams and brings the best out of each individual working towards a common goal for clients. Cutting through the guff to get to the best outcome for the team and clients and having fun along the way. Steven has all the needed formal education, on the job experience and credentials to help businesses and teams succeed in their ambition. He has a level of energy that is unmatched and is naturally set to be positive and he is often described as bringing the Woo Hoo to every interaction.
Isabel Zhang
General Manager, Cross Cultural Insights
Isabel Zhang General Manager, Cross Cultural Insights
Isabel is a powerhouse researcher, business strategist and cultural evangelist. She is driven to do both great work and to make the world a better place. Isabel builds deep connections with community and stakeholders to truly get to the heart of the matter for her clients – building the ‘bridge’ between multicultural and mainstream. She goes beyond the ‘typical’ and ‘traditional’; always focused on the best outcome and the richest insights. With over 20 years’ experience, Isabel is an killer cultural & commercial research specialist, business strategist and cultural consultant. Her dynamic business experience consists of different markets, different industries and different social and cultural segments across the APAC region. Isabel provides powerful insights into the dynamics of multicultural Australia and connecting Culturally And Linguistically Diverse communities.
She has enabled many businesses and government organisations to deal with complex multicultural business and social environments effectively by acts as a compass, guiding and empowering the decision-makers with an in-depth understanding of cultural nuances, facilitating strategic planning, and policymaking. Isabel also acts as a Goodwill Ambassador for the Museum of Chinese Australian History. Isabel is a proud tiger mum, who sports multiple tattoos and owns a killer pair of combat boots!
Joanne Adams
Group Client Director, Qualitative
Joanne Adams Group Client Director, Qualitative
Joanne loves talking to people to understand why they 'do what they do'…. Unpacking what drives them to the buy certain products, brands and services over others. She is also intent on delivering insights that add to, and challenge, clients' thinking, and that they can easily translate into action.
Jo has a background in both quantitative and qualitative research but is more fascinated by human needs, motivations and behaviour. She leads the qualitative practice, and draws on thinking from biology, anthropology, psychology and economics / decision science to design research, and frame the insights story. In the past 25+ years Joanne has conducted research in multiple countries, across multiple markets and categories, using any number of qualitative techniques. Her experience involves consumer and B2B in-depth interviews, group discussions, extended ideation / creative workshop and online communities. Joanne does not love cooking but does love to travel, enjoys watching sport (including American college football) and reading Japanese crime fiction.
James Wunsch
Group Client Director, Government & Social
James Wunsch Group Client Director, Government & Social
James brings a powerful mix of creativity, pragmatism and political nous - ensuring clients receive evidence-driven and informed strategic counsel. Partnering with client on complex policy, service or program challenges, James is passionate about leveraging insights to improve government decision making and ultimately the lives of his fellow Australians. First are foremost, James appreciates that research approaches hold no inherent value – the most eloquently crafted survey hold little value if it is not collecting the data needed to address a client’s challenge or problem. To this end, he works hard at the front end of all projects to develop a sound appreciation of the context and the key decisions the research outcomes will inform. This detailed understanding then ensures all research approaches are aligned with these core requirements, meaning clients get the data and insights they need. MBA and QPR qualified, James brings both the technical skills and significant social & government experiences to generate tangible and actionable value. A career in research has equipped James with a wide range of knowledge across many diverse, eclectic and sometimes downright bizzarro fields – meaning he’s great company at a BBQ and also a fearsome competitor at pub trivia!
Tabitha Lucas
Group Client Director
Tabitha Lucas Group Client Director
Tab loves getting into peoples’ heads. She is your go to for creative and carefully considered solutions to all your research problems. She is also passionate about designing deliverables that are engaging and make it quick and easy for you to know ‘where to from here’. Tab is a ‘specialist generalist’, who leads the quantitative team and loves all things numbers, while also being an experienced and enthusiastic qualitative practitioner. Together with an obsession with design and data visualisation, she has spent 25+ years delving deep into human behaviour, uncovering patterns and the ‘big picture’ in data (qualitative & quantitative), and making sure the way insights are communicated gets clients’ excited.
Tab has a solid understanding and experience across a wide range of industries, techniques and methodologies. This includes everything from online communities (from their earliest days in Australia as part of Latitude Insights), to moderating focus groups, car clinics and large quantitative tracking and segmentation studies. Tab also loves a beer and a chat and goes to the gym all the time (in her head…)
Nicole Lobosco
Group Client Director
Nicole Lobosco Group Client Director
Nic’s passion for digging into data is unmatched. She is an expert at taking a data set and quickly seeing the story. Critically, she can also communicate that story clearly and concisely to her clients: taking you from a sea of numbers to clear direction as to ‘where to’ from here. Particularly when it comes to branding and comms! Nic is an enthusiastic, dynamic, highly organised and hard-working researcher with over 20 years’ experience in the market research industry. She is passionate about techniques and ways of understanding human behaviour to unlock strategy and growth. She prides herself on being committed to constantly lifting the bar and finding the most effective and efficient way to achieve great results leading to real and meaningful change for her clients.
Over her career, Nic has gained a great deal of experience in a wide range of commercial industries, social and government sectors. Nicole’s expertise lies in quantitative methodologies and in particular in brand and comms evaluation work where her understanding of complex data and the use of nuanced data analysis techniques allows her to effectively evaluate long term trends. Nicole also plays a major role in the operations of the business. She has a pivotal and critical focus within the team to ensure that all projects are well resourced and are delivered on time and with full integrity. This role also means that Nicole carries the honour of being our QA Officer and ensures that all studies meet ISO requirements so that we can maintain our ISO20252 accreditation.
Her ‘other’ job is as a mum, which also means uber driver, chef and cleaner who's always tired and runs on coffee. And anyone who knows me knows Christmas is my happy place
Ann-Louise Brockelsby
Research Director
Ann-Louise Brockelsby Research Director
Ann-Louise brings a wealth of knowledge and expertise to her social and government clients. Her extensive experience brings a deep understanding of the sector and the ability to navigate its complexities. Ann-Louise is passionate about working closely with her clients to achieve actionable insights from high-quality research, with robust outcomes that can stand up to critical scrutiny. Ann-Louise has over 25 years of experience dedicated to government and social research and provides a full range of market and social research skills. She is a highly skilled, respectful and empathetic qualitative researcher who has developed a vast toolbox of techniques to enable respondents to express themselves. Ann-Louise is also an experienced quantitative researcher who is just as comfortable analysing a large data set to find the story for her clients. Ann-Louise has worked across a diverse project portfolio including telecommunications, health, education, primary industries, transport and customer service – across both state and federal government agencies.
Ann-Louise is passionate about conducting research that has a genuine impact on people's lives. She loves seeing the insights from her research making a difference, whether that be ensuring puppies are purchased from a responsible breeder or improving the health outcomes for our most vulnerable community members. Outside of work Ann-Louise is often seen enjoying a dinner out paired with her beloved chardy and is also often heard from a mile away with her signature laugh.
Sandra Kowalski
Client Director
Sandra Kowalski Client Director
Meticulous, precise, organised – Sandra is all about getting projects completed to the highest of standards. She has a particular eye for detail making sure that projects run smoothly and that they ultimately deliver actionable outcomes for clients. Sandra is a driven and dedicated dual researcher with 9+ years’ of mixed methodological experience to her name – while she likes speaking to people to understand the ‘why’, she equally loves looking at stats and figures. Sandra has worked across a multitude of different clients in terms of sector, size and target audiences including work with both commercial and government clients, although her true passion lies in the social and not for profit space and being able to make a meaningful difference for clients and ultimately the Australian community.
Sandra is the key account lead for a large community – working on a variety of projects from concept testing, campaign evaluations, usage and attitudes, sentiment studies, customer satisfaction, user experience, etc. – to answer questions for clients in a timely and actionable manner. Sandra is a beach bum by summer (you’ll find her on her paddleboard) and a snow bunny by winter (wishes she was cool enough to board but is a skier).
Chris Brown
Client Manager
Chris Brown Client Manager
Chris understands the role of a client manager is like that of a blindside flanker. He’ll put in the graft to ensure his client are passed the reliable intel they need to make the big calls and ‘kick goals’. Chris has 8 years experience accumulated across client- and agency-side research, working on an array of research spanning consumer brands, business-to-business enterprise, social and government. Whatever the brief he has the qual, quant and project management skills to help his team meet objectives on time… and relishes a quick turnaround project! As a proud pom (well at least when they’re in possession of the Ashes), Chris has spent time working in several countries (Ireland, Netherlands, Germany and now Australia). This journey has provided him with opportunities to shamelessly borrow methodologies, and to ensure no client question is served up with an approach that isn’t at least well thought through, even if ultimately an online survey is the way to go.
A one-time (mad) scientist with a Masters in Chemistry, Chris has the analytical smarts to determine which findings are the critical elements of formula. Outside of work Chris is a keen rower at Hawthorn Rowing Club (a hobby that also sometimes involves some occasional graft). To give back he volunteers as the club’s secretary. If you would like to go for a row after your visit to our Cremorne offices just ask…
Luke Chen
Client Manager
Luke Chen Client Manager
Luke's unique mindset seamlessly connects the broader societal context, human behavior, perceptions, and beliefs, all converging to offer a clear and pragmatic path for optimising your return on investment in insights. Luke is an accomplished generalist practitioner with seven years of valuable experience in the field. His career has primarily revolved around working closely with clients, allowing him to appreciate the vital role of research in making successful business decisions. Over the years, Luke has worked with a diverse range of private and public clients in various sectors.Luke's expertise extends across multiple methodological approaches, encompassing qualitative and quantitative research, online communities, and User Experience research. He excels in bringing clarity to intricate social and business problems, functioning as a catalyst for key stakeholders to devise and confidently implement strategies that optimise their decisions.
When he's not busy with his professional pursuits, you can often find him enthusiastically bingeing on history documentaries or engrossed in the pages of history books and journals on international relations. His love for these subjects not only deepens his expertise but also makes him a captivating storyteller and a font of interesting facts at social gatherings.
Tara Fitzgerald
Client Manager
Tara Fitzgerald Client Manager
Forever curious and always learning, Tara's approach to market research is all about connecting the dots, deciphering the stories hidden within the data that drive human behaviour. With 5 years of experience, Tara is a driven and dedicated 'specialist generalist’. While she loves getting into the nitty gritty of the numbers and stats, she's equally passionate about chatting to people to understand the 'why’. Tara has demonstrated this expertise across a range of quantitative and qualitative studies, as well as long term online panels and communities. Constantly pushing herself to learn and grow, she recently completed a qualification in UX/UI design to expand her expertise in User Experience - a field she's deeply passionate about.
Tara's clientele portfolio is diverse, from corporate clients to government agencies, demonstrating her adaptability and expertise across industries. However, it is working on social and not-for-profit projects that she finds truly rewarding, knowing that her efforts directly contribute to a meaningful impact within the Australian community.Tara is the team's go-to person for restaurant and bar recommendations. When she's not working, you can find her exploring new local gems, checking out art exhibitions, or escaping the city for a hike, taking full advantage of all that regional Victoria has to offer!
Larissa Huang
Senior Client Executive
Larissa Huang Senior Client Executive
Larissa’s passion lies in everything data-related- from crunching numbers and analysis to making your insights stories come alive in visually engaging ways. Larissa has almost four years of experience in market and social research. She’s been involved end-to-end on a wide-range of various quantitative and qualitative research projects, spanning from large-scale government ones to more niche commercial ones. She's a sharp and analytical researcher and loves digging out meaningful insights for her clients. Her academic background in psychology and marketing from Monash University has fueled her inquisitiveness about the 'whys' behind human behaviour – what drives people to think, feel, and act the way they do. Outside of her research work, she's a serious foodie, and always on the hunt for the next delicious meal.
Annabel Pittendrigh
Client Executive CCI
Annabel Pittendrigh Client Executive CCI
Annabel is an accomplished researcher dedicated to understanding and empowering multicultural communities. With a strong passion for knowledge and a remarkable aptitude for language and culture, she possesses a distinctive skill set that sets her apart in her field. Throughout her career, Annabel has been involved in groundbreaking and innovative research initiatives, providing invaluable insights into the challenges and barriers faced by multicultural communities in Australia.
Her expertise spans social, government, and commercial sectors, where she collaborates with esteemed clients to promote positive change and inclusivity. By connecting with grassroots multicultural community members, Annabel raises awareness about the importance of research and facilitates their engagement, bridging the gap between research and real-life impact. Outside of work, you'll catch Annabel testing out new recipes in the kitchen or spending quality time with friends and family (often with a cocktail in hand!).
Adele Giulieri
Client Coordinator - insights
Adele Giulieri Client Coordinator - insights
Del loves to uncover the ‘why’ in human behaviour, particularly consumers. As a curious, hands-on and dualist researcher, she is passionate about creating evidence-based and actionable insights for clients by looking beyond the obvious and digging deep! Del’s digital marketing and sales background, in combination with her experience working client side, sparked an appetite to understand what makes consumers tick and a love for market research. She is driven to transform user experience, design and sales by challenging conventional ways of thinking to develop custom strategies and insights for clients.
With extensive experience across both quantitative and qualitative research methodologies, Del has worked across a variety of industries including retail, FMCG, tourism, financial institutions, sport, health, transport, insurance and education. Del holds a Bachelor of Business (Human Resource Management) and a Bachelor of Marketing from Monash University in Melbourne and is a full member of The Research Society. When Del is not working, you can find her painting, visiting art galleries or cooking up Italian dishes and serving anything with limoncello. She is also is a black belt in martial arts and an adrenaline junkie (think skydiving in NZ and swimming with sharks).
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