Ogilvy New York chief creative officer Corinna Falusi announced last week that she would be leaving the organization after more than 4 1/2 years to lead creative at Mother New York.
She will become chief creative officer at the latter agency as of December 1.
In a statement, Mother founding partner and creative chairman Paul Malmstrom said:
“We feel Corinna belongs here at Mother. She has a magical mix of talent, ambition, and soulfulness With her, we’ll continue to bring even greater expressions of creativity to our clients.”
CEO Peter Ravailhe added:
“With her relentless pursuit of excellence, in craft and creativity, Corinna will add incredible value to the brands we love to work with, and to Mother as a whole.”
An Ogilvy representative declined to comment on Falusi’s departure, but a source close to the agency told us it has begun seeking her successor and that it will search both internally and externally for its next creative leader. Prior to today’s announcement, Mother New York hired three new creatives to work across its client roster with a focus on the Target and Stella Artois accounts.
Falusi started her agency career at her native Germany’s Jung Von Matt before moving to StrawberryFrog, where she spent nearly a decade in Amsterdam and New York and worked on accounts ranging from P&G to Frito Lay. She joined Ogilvy in 2012, and last January the WPP shop promoted her to replace former CCO Calle Sjoenell, who left two summers ago to run Lowe Brindfors in Sweden. While serving as chief creative officer over the past year-plus, Falusi continued to run the Coca-Cola and IKEA accounts while also “driv[ing] the creative vision of the New York agency.”
The release does not elaborate on specific reasons for her departure, but we did acquire the internal email announcement that went out to all New York Ogilvy staff on Friday via North American CCO Steve Simpson and New York CEO Lou Aversano. It reads:
CORINNA FALUSI
Four years ago, Corinna Falusi joined Ogilvy. From her very first day, Corinna began to pour all of her passion and energy into the work and into her relationships with all of us. And she continued to do this every day, without fail.
Today, one thousand six hundred and fourteen days later, we regret to announce that Corinna has decided to leave us to take on new and different challenges.
We can feel sad about this—nobody who worked with her can help it—but the most important thing to do is thank her: for her work, her mentorship and her partnership, which she gave to us fully for over four years, every single day.
We will miss Corinna’s special spirit and point of view, but we are lucky to have incredible and passionate creative leaders. Kristy, Alfonso, and Teddy will be gathering the creative department together to discuss our path forward.
Steve SimpsonLou Aversano
