Once dubbed “Perth’s most awarded expat creative” by Campaign Brief, Reed Collins is “expat” no more as he’s heading back home to Australia to take on a “big creative leadership job” according to Leo Burnett Chicago, where Collins has spent the last several years as SVP/ECD.
Prior to joining Leo, Collins (right) basically crisscrossed the globe, working at agencies on four continents including Mojo & Partners in Sydney, TBWA\Hunt Lascaris in Johannesburg, Lowe Howard-Spink in London and the now-defunct Cliff Freeman & Partners in NYC. According to the 2001 Gunn Report, Collins’ Fox Sports TV campaign was the most-awarded worldwide that year.
Collins isn’t the only one leaving Leo Burnett as of late as John Carstens, who’d served as global creative lead on Blackberry during the course of 2010, is headed over to SapientNitro. Meanwhile, John Greene, who’s spent over three years at the agency as SVP/group planning director, is joining up with Translation. But as far as the tips telling us that Leo CDs Ryan Wagman (ex-CPB) and Nuno Ferrera are leaving for gigs at Groupon, the agency tells us that they “aren’t going anywhere.”
Update: Collins is going to be the national CCO of the Campaign Palace Australia starting in February.