Arnold Loses Account Exec To Rival Mullen

Rick Humphrey, a former senior account manager at Arnold Communications, last week joined Mullen to oversee The Stanley Works account.
Humphrey, who serviced clients such as Volkswagen of America and Fleet Financial Group during his five-year tenure at Arnold, has been given the title of account supervisor at Mullen in Wenham, Mass.
He is reunited with former colleague George Rogers, senior vice president and group account director at Mullen. Rogers also worked on the Volkswagen account while at Arnold.
“We looked around at all the people we knew of and thought he was the right choice,” Rogers said. “He’s really a well-rounded guy . . . He has a real solid background. It’s a perfect match [for Mullen].”
Humphrey made the move “for a new set of challenges and an opportunity at this time in my career,” he said. “It’s nothing against Arnold. I had an unbelievable time there, but I thought it might be time for a whole new environment . . . It also helps that I live two miles from [Wenham], but I took that out of the equation.”
Humphrey is a fourth-generation ad man. His great-grandfather founded The H.B. Humphrey Co. in 1886, and his father was a founding partner of Humphrey Browning MacDougall, a precursor to Arnold.
Joining Arnold first as an intern, the younger Humphrey started as an account coordinator for Fleet. He later worked on the New England Aquarium business and helped pitch the Volkswagen account, which he then concentrated on exclusively.
Humphrey spent nearly a year at the automaker’s U.S. headquarters in Auburn Hills, Mich., where he worked in the marketing department to get a better idea of its operating procedure.
In January, Mullen was named lead agency for The Stanley Works in New Britain, Conn., responsible for corporate branding. The $10-15 million account was previously handled by Ammirati Puris Lintas in New York, which resigned after nine years as lead agency for the tool maker.