Who Are Film Fixers Balkans and Why You Should Remember Their Name?

In the age of the post-covid ad industry – with shrunk budgets and competition as fierce as ever – to be successful in the service production business in Eastern Europe takes more than just competitive prices.

Companies are pushed to be more creative, to offer more to their clients and to be quicker than ever.

With these challenges in mind Film Fixers Balkans entered the commercial production market just about a year and a half ago – and they are offering unique ways to go around them.

Originally specialising in TV production in more than 15 countries across the Balkans and Eastern Europe, the company already had strong ties to the industries in most of those countries, which very naturally translated into the commercial production business.

With one of the biggest location databases in the region, access to hundreds of professionals and an extremely flexible business model, FFB offer second-to-none services for commercials, music videos – especially for projects with which production companies initially have budget issues. They’ve already solved such issues for companies from the UK, the US, Germany, South Korea, Netherlands, Poland and more.

We talk with Yavor Gadzhev, line producer and bidding producer at FFB.

LBB> Tell us what’s unique about Film Fixers Balkans?

Yavor> Definitely the huge area which we cover – we work in every country from Hungary to Turkey – and our problem solving skills, which we acquired through years of work in TV.

LBB> Why did you decide to start offering services for commercials and music videos?

Yavor> To be fair, we’ve always offered these serviceс, but they weren’t always our priority. Now that’s changed – mainly because the advertising industry is more creative and very dynamic – and we love a challenge at FFB! Our team is young and ambitious and is very excited about what’s possible to express in a short 15 or 30 sec spot if you’re creative.

LBB> What are some of your favourite projects you’ve worked on?

Yavor> We did a very ambitious spot for Gamrfirst, servicing Papaya films, which ranks among my favourite projects. There we worked with Lonan Garcia, a very talented and demanding director and we had to keep up with his imagination! The end result is spectacular though, it was absolutely worth the long hours of work for all the departments. As I said, I love a challenge and I get excited when we have to be creative to get around issues.

Another favourite of mine is beabadoobee - Take a Bite – a music video we did with Park Pictures – this was an example of when everything clicked from the time we first got in touch with the producer – Rowan Mackintosh King – and it was smooth sailing from there on. 

And lastly I’d like to mention a magnificent video we did for Blanco, one of the biggest Italian popstars right now, it’s called Bruciasse Il Cielo – we serviced Illmatic Film Group. We had a very limited budget to work with – and we turned it into one of the music videos of the year.

LBB> Where do you do the most of your work?

Yavor> Most of our work is spread between a few countries – namely Bulgaria, Romania, Serbia, Slovenia, Croatia and lately Albania.

LBB> What are the strongest points to these countries?

Yavor> I’ll be brief – Bulgaria is very suitable for studio builds, art department heavy jobs; Romania and Serbia likewise, with minor differences; Slovenia is the absolute leader in terms of nature locations – mountains, lakes and mountain roads, architecture; Croatia is hands down the best place to film on the seaside, coastal roads and their old towns. But the thing that few of the production companies know is that you can find all these qualities in all of these countries – you don’t have to stick to the “stereotypical” strong sides that I mentioned above.

LBB> What are your team’s strongest sides?

Yavor> Flexibility, attention to the client, budget management, problem solving and thinking out of the box. We are far from being stuck in our ways and are always open to making new things happen, trying out seemingly impossible things and creatively solving issues.

LBB> What’s your goal for the remaining months of this year and for next year?

Yavor> In the next 18 months we want to complete our goal of making FFB a popular name in the industry and a leader in the production services front; we want to be well-known both in Europe and across the Atlantic in the US. Next year we are expanding our efforts with visits to North America and with creating bonds with US clients.