Today we can confirm that three top executives have either left or will be leaving their respective agencies.
First: Tito Melega, who was creative director, Americas at TBWA\Chiat\Day, is no longer with the agency as of today. Melega, who spent four years with TBWA, described his own role as “Creative Director, Americas of all things Nissan.”
At the moment we have no word on where Melega is heading or who will replace him, though a spokesperson tells us that CCO Steven Butler “is currently creative lead” on Nissan. For context, the client most recently shared a bit of “Tough Love” via 80s rocker Bret Michaels.
Logic would lead one to believe that Melega will land another role at a major agency, quite possibly one with notable auto industry clients: prior to joining TBWA and working on Nissan, he held the VP/CD position at BBDO, where his accounts included Mitsbushi.
He was an art director at Team One from 2000 to 2005, and his earlier career includes stints at AD positions with JWT, Fallon, Ogilvy and Saatchi & Saatchi Los Angeles.
When Publicis announced big changes at its agencies just over a month ago, one name that went unmentioned was Pete Stein, CEO of Razorfish. Last week AdAge confirmed that he will be leaving the agency at the end of the year.
Stein’s pending departure is only the latest change to stem from Publicis Groupe’s decision to mash “Razorfish, Rosetta, LEVEL Studios, Denuo brands, and portions of the Groupe’s latest acquisition, Nurun” together to create Razorfish Global. When Rosetta’s Tom Adamski was named to lead this new entity, many assumed Stein would depart Razorfish; sources told AdAge that the agency wanted him to “stick around and take on a new role,” but as of this moment there’s no information on where Stein will go next or who will be included in the leadership team that Adamski will announce “in the coming weeks.”
Executive Creative Director Patrick McHugh has left Burlington, Vermont’s KSV approximately three months after joining the agency.
While an agency press release from August 18 told us that McHugh would “oversee all creative work, including that for KSV clients National Grid and Mass Save,” the relationship does not appear to have been a good fit. McHugh appears to have gone the freelance route, listing his portfolio under current employment.
McHugh also has an extensive agency background: his first major creative position was ACD at Leo Burnett Chicago, after which he spent time with Campbell-Ewald, McCann, Y&R, Team Detroit and GS&P before joining Razorfish as CD/copywriter.
McHugh’s best-known recent work for Razorfish was the tweeting #UseMeLeaveMe bikes campaign, which earned the agency attention at last year’s South by Southwest Festival.