The New York offices of Havas have named two new ECDs, promoting group creative director Kate McCagg and hiring BBDO veteran Louis-Philippe or LP Tremblay.
The two will help lead Havas’ creative department forward under the inter-office “Village” model, with both reporting to chief creative officer of the Americas Toygar Bazarkaya.
“Kate and LP represent a rare breed of creative leadership,” said Bazarkaya in a statement. “Both come from early digital pure plays and have a wealth of traditional agency experience. But what’s very telling about our industry is that they’ve never been able to use the full potential of their strengths in one place. With media, data, creative and cognitive right under our roof, Kate’s and LP’s unique skillsets and proven understanding of brands will help take our clients’ needs and work into the future. Kate’s and LP’s passion and collaborative spirit are hard to find, and I can’t wait for the great things to come.”
McCagg came to Havas New York in 2014 after several years with Razorfish Portland. She was hired to work on the Mondelez account but eventually shifted to pharma giant RB/Reckitt Benckiser; earlier gigs include writing copy at Ogilvy and Y&R.
Tremblay was a senior creative director on BBDO’s AT&T account, including the “Too Close to Home” campaign, before leaving last year for Brooklyn-based unit N/A, which defines itself as “Good Marketing.” He previously held design and creative director roles at several international agencies including Sid Lee Toronto, AKQA, W+K London, JWT and DDB Toronto.
We heard word of McCagg’s promotion several months ago, but it’s just become official. Moving forward, she will continue working on various RB brands (some went to McCann over the summer), but the precise scope of the new ECDs’ roles has yet to be determined.
Havas has made several significant hires in recent months: chief talent officer Jennifer Marszalek joined the Chicago operation from GrubHub in May; former Droga5 creatives Pete Gosselin and Jay Hunt went to New York in August to work on TD Ameritrade; Havas Boston hired Minnie Damle (formerly of VaynerMedia) as its CTO earlier this month.
The New York office’s last headlining campaign was October’s debut of Dos Equis’ new Most Interesting Man in the World.