Two Exit Cole & Weber

By Angela Dawson





LOS ANGELES–The two top executives of Cole & Weber’s Portland, Ore., office have exited the shop.





Brian Ribbey, managing director of the office for the last five months, resigned last week. Steve Johnston, a six-year veteran of Cole & Weber and its creative director for the last two months, left several weeks ago. He joined Fallon McElligott as a copywriter in Minneapolis last week.





Both executives had been commuting to Portland from Seattle homes, and cited the tactical difficulty of leaving their families for days at a time as a reason for leaving the agency.





‘I’m looking at putting something together on my own or with partners in Seattle,’ said Ribbey, who joined the agency about a year ago from The Mednick Group in Los Angeles.





Johnston could not pass up an opportunity to work at the much larger Fallon, he said.





Debby Kennedy, president of both the Portland office and the agency’s...