Around 59 full-time equivalents (financial year 2024).

Review: Havas

Q: What is Havas specialised in?

Campaign concepts & big ideas, Campaign execution, Influencer & creator marketing, Organic social content, Social strategy & platform mix, CRM & lifecycle strategy.

Q: Who are the clients of Havas?

Among others Luminus, Soubry, Jacqmotte, Aderco, Federale Verzekering, Côte d’Or.

Havas is een full-service bureau met thuisbasis in Brussel, opgericht in 2001. Met ongeveer 59 VTE is dit een groot bureau. De dienstverlening draait om creatie & reclame en paid media (sea/social/display). Namen die publiek aan dit bureau gelinkt worden: Luminus, Soubry, Jacqmotte en Aderco. Het bureau maakt deel uit van Havas.

Awards

3× IAB MIXX Awards

3× Effie Awards Belgium

1

How this agency makes money

Revenue, margin and what an hour of work brings in. Everything on the earning side sits together here.

Revenue trendgross margin per financial year

2021202220232024

Latest year: € 3,80 mln gross margin, growth -16,1% against a sector median of +1,4%.

Shrinking

MarginEBITDA / gross margin · value-added coverage

2021202220232024

HavasSector median

EBITDA margin -12,6%, sector median 21,9%. Value-added coverage 0,91 (median 1,24).

Loss-making

Revenue per headGross margin per FTE, against payroll cost

€ 64.133

Median (2024) € 72.161

Against a payroll cost of € 89.003 per FTE. The ratio between the two is the coverage rate above.

Below the median

Yield levelYield per hour worked, against payroll cost

€ 41

Median (2024) € 44

93.122 hours worked, 1.573 per FTE. Against that sits € 57 of payroll cost per hour worked, leaving € -16 for premises, equipment, depreciation and profit.

Around the median

No hourly rate follows from this. Gross margin is already net of services and sundry goods, which mixes rebilled production with the agency's own overhead, and the accounts do not say how many hours were billable. Deriving a rate from this systematically understates it.

2

Can the agency take a hit

Buffer, cash position and payment behaviour side by side, so you can see where they disagree.

Bufferequity in months of payroll

Buffer: 0,1 months. Equity in the latest year: € 45.837.

Group entity - see note

Cash positionAvailable cash, and whether it covers short-term debt

Cash € 0. Liquidity ratio 1,00: current assets cover short-term debt in full. Solvency 0,1%.

Tightly covered

Payment behaviourTowards suppliers and towards the NBB

Trade payables correspond to 122 days of supplier credit, sector median 61. The accounts were filed 449 days after closing; the legal deadline is seven months.

Filed late

3

Signals and strengths

Events from the CBE and the Official Gazette over the past 24 months, plus positive markers derived from the figures.

Continuity

1 red flag(s) (24m)

Signals in the last 24 months

Zichtbaarheid verschoven · 1 Nov 2026 · Google Autocomplete
Zichtbaarheid verschoven · 1 Oct 2026 · Google Autocomplete
Zichtbaarheid verschoven · 1 Sep 2026 · Google Autocomplete
Zichtbaarheid verschoven · 1 Sep 2026 · Google Autocomplete
Board change · 10 Apr 2026 · Staatsblad
Appointments or resignations on the board. Routine during growth, succession or a new partner. Ask about it when several changes follow each other closely.
Late filing · 25 Mar 2026 · NBB
The annual accounts were filed after the statutory deadline. Over a third of the sector does this, usually because of the accountant's calendar. Rarely a story in itself.
+ 3 older signals within 24m

Click a signal for a plain-language explanation. Each signal is a fact from a public source, without the agency's own context. Best to ask them directly.

What this agency does well

Team grew (+2,1% FTE in the latest year)

Each point is a fact from the filed annual accounts, measured against the same thresholds and sector medians as the signals above.

4

All the figures

Reference material, not a starting point. Expand it if you want to read the series yourself.

4 financial years, 2021 to 2024Result, staff and balance sheet

	2021	2022	2023	2024
Result
Gross margin	€ 4,36 mln	€ 4,29 mln-1,6%	€ 4,53 mln+5,6%	€ 3,80 mln-16,1%
EBITDA	€ -1,72 mln	€ 428.337	€ -65.125	€ -478.733
EBITDA margin	-39,4%	10%	-1,4%	-12,6%
Staff
FTE	58,0	56,4-2,8%	58,0+2,8%	59,2+2,1%
Gross margin per FTE	€ 75.113	€ 76.010	€ 78.045	€ 64.133
Payroll cost per FTE	€ 68.127	€ 74.893	€ 87.275	€ 89.003
Balance sheet
Equity	€ -1,11 mln	€ 927.041	€ 694.912	€ 45.837
Cash	€ 9.075	-	-	€ 0
Liquidity ratio	1,02	1,02	1,01	1,00

Payroll cost per FTE comes from the social report where available, otherwise from the Remuneration line. Both are gross costs including employer contributions.

Group entity. This agency is a subsidiary of an (international) group. Thin equity at network subsidiaries is often group policy (management fees, dividends to the parent) rather than a distress signal. The buffer dimension is therefore not assessed.

What this factsheet does not know

How good the work is. Figures do not measure creativity, strategy or chemistry.
How the client portfolio is spread. Concentration is not in the accounts.
Freelancers and subcontractors are not in the FTE figures. An agency with 40 staff may in practice run with 70 people.
The figures cover financial year 2024, filed on 25/03/2026. At a fast-moving agency reality today may differ.

Based on publicly filed annual accounts (NBB) and official records (CBE, Belgian Official Gazette). An indication, not financial advice. Sector medians calculated on 2 Nov 2026. Sector medians based on financial year 2024: the last year for which nearly all accounts have been filed.

What the agency actually does 14 services

Advertising & Campaigns

Campaign concepts & big ideas Campaign execution

Social, Influencer & Community

Influencer & creator marketing Organic social content Social strategy & platform mix

CRM, Email & Loyalty

CRM & lifecycle strategy Direct marketing & lead management Marketing automation

PR & Reputation

Corporate communication PR strategy & media relations

Employer Brand & Internal

Internal communication

Events, Sponsoring & Activation

Brand activation (incl. guerrilla) Events & experiences Sponsorship & partnerships

Sector focus

Energy & utilitiesFMCGFinance & insuranceFood & beverage

Publicly known clients

LuminusSoubryJacqmotteAdercoFederale VerzekeringCôte d’Or

Based on IKAg research and public sources. Incomplete or outdated? Let us know.

1

People 3 people mapped

A small team: short lines, little noise between you and the makers.

JN

Jurgen Noël

Business Unit Director

SC

Stijn Cox

CEO Havas Belgium, CEO Havas Creative I CX

DC

Davy Claes

Head of Digital Operations & Support

Based on public profiles. Something wrong? Let us know.

2

Seniors or juniors?

Payroll cost per FTE is the best public proxy for a team's experience level. Higher is not automatically better, but it says something about who sits at the table.

Payroll cost per FTE

€ 89.003

+56% versus the median

Team composition

59,2 FTE

61% women
39% men

€ 89.003

Median Full-service bureau (2024) € 57.083All agencies (2024) € 59.021

Read with care. Directors and partners invoicing through a management company are not in the payroll cost. At small agencies this skews the picture downwards considerably.

3

Will your team stay?

Inflow and outflow from the social report. This series only counts people on the payroll: freelancers who invoice do not appear in it. A low figure therefore means two very different things, a stable permanent team or a small core with heavy outsourcing. A high figure usually points to short contracts. Compare only within the same type of agency.

Exits 2024

35,5%

Median for this type of agency (2024): 32,8%

Inflow 2024

29,4%

17,4 FTE in, 21,0 FTE out

Net team change

-3,6 FTE

2021202220232024

Source: annual accounts and social reports (NBB), collected by IKAg. Financial year 2024. Calculations by IKAg; an indication, not financial advice. Sector medians based on financial year 2024: the last year for which nearly all accounts have been filed.

Award-winning work 6 award(s)

2025

IAB MIXX Awards SilverBest International Tool · “Carrefour” · source ↗

2024

IAB MIXX Awards SilverData/Dashboarding · “Carrefour” · source ↗

2022

IAB MIXX Awards SilverBest E-Commerce · “Carrefour” · source ↗

2021

Effie Awards Belgium Bronze“Côte d'Or. C'est tellement nous. — Côte d'Or” · source ↗

2020

Effie Awards Belgium Bronze“Challenger à accélérateur crédible — Luminus” · source ↗

2016

Effie Awards Belgium Bronze“Het kan anders — Hans Anders” · source ↗

As published by the organising award shows, collected by IKAg.