On Friday, employees of Crispin, Porter + Bogusky received an internal memo confirming that President Steve Erich would be leaving the agency after more than a decade.
While we don’t have that memo on hand, we do have a statement from CEO Andrew Keller:
“After over 11 years with CP+B, most recently as President/Partner, Steve Erich, has decided to leave the agency to pursue new opportunities. During Steve’s tenure, he helped lead the agency to unprecedented growth and success. We remain great fans and friends and look forward to seeing what he will achieve next.”
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Erich, who worked in various accounts/management positions at TBWA and The Martin Agency before joining Crispin in 2004, began there as a director on the Burger King business and worked his way up through the organization in subsequent years, earning partner status in 2008 amidst the shakeup caused by the departure of VP/CD Rob Strasberg (now with Doner). He was named to the managing director position in 2012.
In assuming the presidency last January, Erich replaced Jeff Steinhour, who was promoted back in 2010 in the same move that made Keller CEO and Rob Reilly CCO. Steinhour took the vice chairman title while Erich was tasked with running the agency’s five offices and focusing on new business development.
Erich wasn’t not the only high-level employee to leave the CP+B team last week: Angel Anderson, who served as VP/experience director, also left to pursue new opportunities (at least one of which is her startup NailSnaps, Inc.). EVP/executive tech director Dan Fox left his position earlier in the week; tipsters tell us that his resignation stemmed in part from a gradual downsizing of Crispin’s in-house tech department. Former record company executive Mike Saunter, who became COO around the same time that Erich got his promotion, also left the agency approximately two months ago.
It would seem that Lori Senecal, the president/CEO of parent company MDC Partners who was also appointed to the global CEO position at Crispin in March, is following the lead of newly promoted executives on the client side who choose to shake up their executive teams and agency rosters in the interest of refreshing their organizations.
No word at the moment on Crispin’s plans to fill any of the newly open positions mentioned above.