KALARA MEANS
LIGHT AND CLARITY
Helping APAC and Challenger brands move through cultural nuance without dulling their edge.
ABOUT KALARA STUDIOS
Led by Strategy Director, Olivia Cham
Kalara Studios is a specialised brand strategy consultancy helping challengers and femtech brands navigate the Asia-Pacific region. We bridge the gap between Western brand standards and local cultural nuance.
The studio is led by Olivia Cham, a strategist with over a decade of experience at agencies like TBWA, AKA Asia, and Dentsu. Having partnered with brands including Durex, McDonald’s, Porsche, and Kraft Heinz, Olivia brings big-agency rigour to a lean, independent studio model.
Most brands expanding in APAC face the same tension: play it safe and fade into sameness, or push too hard and miss the mark. Kalara Studios exists to help you make clear, confident decisions that protect your brand’s edge while respecting local realities.
BRAND EXPERIENCE
ENGAGEMENT MODELS
Direct Brand Partnership
Senior strategy support for teams making high-stakes positioning decisions across Asia-Pacific.
Contract Strategy Director
Supporting agencies on a contract basis across pitches, campaigns, and periods of high delivery demand.
Cultural Adaptation Sprint
A focused engagement to adapt your brand’s positioning for Asia-Pacific – without losing its edge.
Clarity Diagnostic
An assessment of what’s landing, what’s not, and what to change – with clear next steps.
STRATEGIC CAPABILITIES
Kalara sits at the intersection of brand strategy and cultural intelligence.
With a background in PR and earned media, Olivia brings a through-the-line perspective across paid, earned, owned, and shared – not just one discipline.
This matters in markets where one wrong channel choice can undermine the entire strategy.
Strategic Leadership
- Fractional strategy support
- Pitch strategy & leadership
- Creative briefs & strategic audits
- Strategic sparring & ongoing advisory
Brand & Narrative Development
- Brand positioning
- Tone of voice & brand personality
- Proposition development
- Creative territories
Campaign & Rollout Strategy
- Comms planning
- Go-to-market & rollout strategy
- Connections planning
- Content strategy (pillars, story arcs)
- Social media strategy (paid and organic)
Research & Insight Development
- Audience understanding & emotional drivers
- Cultural insight development
- Category & competitor mapping
CLIENT RESULTS
Here’s what clients and partners say about working with Olivia.
“It was an absolute pleasure working with Olivia. Together with her team, our brand was able to achieve greater heights in just a span of 12months! An achievement that we never dreamt of achieving as it was an uphill battle for many years. Her articulation of our strategy turned one of the most taboo category into great executions that not only drove us to greater heights in terms of creativity but also business result.”
“Olivia is unerringly accurate in being able to dig deep into human motivations and turn them into sharp and compelling strategic propositions. Her love for creative ideas that are unique and memorable, and her ability to suggest builds that make the ideas watertight against strategy was also very much appreciated by any creative who worked with her.”
“Olivia’s got a knack for thinking on her feet and tackling all kinds of briefs — from the tried-and-true to the totally unconventional. She moves quickly, staying agile and adaptable, effectively digesting large amounts of information and turning it into clear, strategic insights. Her ability to shift gears smoothly between different formats highlights her capacity for both creative thinking and strategic execution.”
“Olivia is able to flex her thinking across a wide range of briefs, from social and integrated campaigns to creative, B2B, G2B and B2C. She is also unfazed by new project teams or large, high-stakes projects. In fact, during her time with us she helped drive multiple big-budget campaigns and even secured two client conversions. I value how communicative and easy she is to work with, and how unafraid she is to share her POV when it counts.”