Ghouls, ghosts, monsters and goblins are all getting ready to scare the pants off the populace in a couple of weeks, but none of those creatures are part of this week’s Revolving Door Roundup, as they’re probably working as props at pop-up Halloween stores right now. In fact, there are no scares to be had at all in the latest collection of agency moves, so have no fear as you walk through this week’s revolving door.
4A’s
The American Association of Advertising Agencies (4A’s), a membership-based U.S. trade association for the advertising and marketing communications industry, has made several new hires. Tamiko Evans will lead the marcomms strategy for the organization as svp, marketing and communications and events. Kevin Freemore joins as svp, media, tech and data, while Andy Goldsmith joins as svp, southern region, member engagement and development, and David-Anthony Powell comes on as svp, central region, member engagement and development.
Barbarian
Eliza Yvette Esquivel has joined Barbarian as chief strategy officer to refine the agency’s strategy and consulting service offerings. She moves to Barbarian from FutureBrand, where she held the same role.
Candid
Candid announced that De Media Maatschap is joining the Candid platform. Stroom, part of Candid since 2017, and De Media Maatschap will merge into a new media agency, with offices in Amsterdam and Rotterdam.
Samantha Catsburg (Stroom) and Willem-Jan Nouwens and Michael Gottmer (both De Media Maatschap) will jointly manage the new agency.
Captura Group
Captura Group, a Hispanic and digital-first agency helping brands connect with and uplift minority communities, has brought on multicultural marketer Andreina Barroso as vice president of amplification. She will lead Captura Group’s paid media, influencer marketing, public relations, shopper marketing, experiential and community engagement.
Barroso brings over 15 years of marketing experience, with a focus on the U.S. Hispanic audience. She has also succeeded as an entrepreneur as a partner of Hispanicize Media Group, as part of the leadership team at Advantage Sales and Marketing’s Mass Hispanic Shopper Agency and most recently as the owner of her own marketing consultancy.
Chemistry
To get to the bottom of the great cereal debate, agency Chemistry conducted a national survey, “The Secret Life of Cereal,” utilizing its research arm, Market Research Lab to carry out the data and insights.
The report surveyed over 1,000 respondents and shows an overwhelming majority (89%) of adults eat cereal, definitively capturing that this lovable food is not just for kids. It also unearths an important truth: 65% of adults eat cereal outside of breakfast, highlighting a major gap in the market between how cereal is advertised and how it’s actually consumed.
Cubocx
Creative agency Cubocx has named André Matarazzo partner and executive creative director. Matarazzo has held long-term leadership positions at Flag, Sid Lee, SapientNitro and McCann-Erickson. Working alongside co-founder Matheus Barros, Matarazzo is behind Cubocx’s brand strategy and creative output.
He created the digital shop Gringo, later selling the agency to WPP. In 2017 he started The Sexy Beast to reinvent how the creative process is run at agencies from the inside out.
Hecho Studios
Hecho Studios has named Celeste Hubbard-Breen as president. Hubbard-Breen joins from Mother LA where she was the head of mothering, overseeing the West Coast client services department and executive client relationships. Previously, Hubbard-Breen held leadership roles at Chemistry ATL, Los York and Hecho Studios’ sister company, 72andSunny.
Imre
Imre has joined in a new partnership with RLH Equity Partners to propel imre’s growth. The partnership, finalized earlier this year, will focus on expanding expertise across services areas, including intel and insights, data and analytics, omnichannel fluency and modern digital and public relations activation.
Jukin Media
Global entertainment company Jukin Media, acquired by Trusted Media Brands in August 2021, is expanding its presence in the Asia Pacific region by hiring Manu Sanghi as senior commercial director, APAC to establish the company’s base of operations in Singapore.
Prior to joining Jukin, Sanghi was the head of ad sales and content partnerships at ESPN in Asia. He has also worked at Scripps Networks and Havas Media Group in Singapore, where he moved from Dubai after spending five years with GroupM.
King Ursa
Toronto-based King Ursa, a full-service agency, has hired Dylan Dempsey as vp of technology to oversee the agency’s technical strategic direction.
Dempsey has been at the intersection of marketing and engineering for over ten years, holding leadership positions at agencies across Canada and the U.S., working for brands including Volkswagen, Samsung, McDonald’s, Wendy’s, General Motors, Nissan, Kraft, Reckitt Benckiser, GSK and Bayer.
Labelium
The Montreal office of global digital performance agency Labelium has been named digital agency of record for Bestseller Canada, a vertical fashion company that designs, sources, distributes and markets a number of clothing brands. Bestseller operates 2,750 stores in 38 markets worldwide. Canada was the first international market for the clothing and accessories company.
Labelium was hired to support Bestseller’s ecommerce growth ambitions.
Mediahub
Mediahub, the global media agency part of IPG, has won the global communications planning and media buying account for Farfetch, a global platform for the luxury fashion industry. In a four-way pitch, Mediahub held off the incumbent agency MediaCom and also Hearts & Science and Havas.
Global strategy, governance, analytics, learning and optimization will be the responsibility of the Farfetch and Mediahub teams in London, while local implementation will be led by Mediahub offices in New York, Dubai and Shanghai. Mediahub’s first campaign will run in April 2022.
Mediahub also announced it has tapped Brandon Corp as vp, business development, U.S. In this new role, Corp will lead the agency’s growth team and manage all new business initiatives.
Corp joins from Publicis Groupe, where he was part of the company’s global business development unit, working on multimarket opportunities. He has also held business development roles with Omnicom’s Annalect and IPG’s Orion Worldwide.
Mother
Mother in L.A. signed a long-term lease in the West Adams neighborhood, moving their West Coast HQ into 27,000 square feet. While many companies are shrinking their real estate investments, Mother, which also has offices in New York, London, and Shanghai, is doubling down, signing a long-term lease in the historic neighborhood.
Ogilvy
The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) has awarded Resilience Action Partners, a joint venture between Ogilvy and Michael Baker International, a new $250 million maximum value indefinite delivery indefinite quantity (IDIQ) contract to provide behavioral science-based risk communication, capacity building and mitigation planning services over the next five years. Resilience Action Partners retained the contract after a competitive review process.
With this renewed and strengthened partnership, there will be a focus on sparking and elevating a national movement towards engaging with communities to address new and changing risks and build equitable community resilience.
Ogilvy’s FEMA CERC team draws on talent in over 20 cities across the country, including experts that span public relations, growth and innovation, advertising, health and experience as well as behavioral science. The team is led out of Ogilvy’s DC office by Lisa Miller, senior vice president and program director of the CERC program, and Meg Bartow, executive vice president of resilience and social impact and CERC executive sponsor.
Pavone Marketing Group
Pavone Marketing Group (PMG), a Pennsylvania-based, independent marketing and research holding company, has acquired Vigor, an Atlanta-based branding and marketing agency that specializes in the restaurant, beverage and hospitality industries.
The acquisition will extend the CPG food and beverage marketing specialization of PMG’s quench. Vigor will retain its name, website, its staff of 10 employees and its location in Atlanta’s West Midtown.
Rauxa
Kelly O’Brien, a data-driven marketing thought leader with experience in pharmaceuticals, tech and mobile, has been named vice president, group strategy director at Rauxa, part of Publicis Groupe. O’Brien, who most recently led her own Beach House Strategies consulting firm, will oversee all patient and professional marketing strategy for Rauxa’s growing healthcare portfolio, which includes Bristol Meyers Squibb and Allergan.
Sensis
Cross-cultural marketing agency Sensis claims that it has become the largest and most diverse 100% minority-owned independent multicultural advertising agency in the U.S. after its acquisition of Atlanta-based PM3. More than two-thirds (70%) of the staff is multicultural and 55% of its 150 employees are women.
The move combines Sensis’ strategic, research-based approach to marketing with PM3’s creative production resources and consumer-brand experience. The new agency will officially take the Sensis name beginning in January 2022. The acquisition was facilitated by Agency Futures.
Stein IAS
Stein IAS has appointed Jeremy Cochran as president, Americas to further the agency’s growth plans in North America.
Cochran joined the agency at the beginning of October following 15 years in various leadership positions at Iris Worldwide. During his tenure there, he led B2B brand engagements in Europe, the U.S. and globally. Before joining Iris, Jeremy transformed London-based Catalyst into an award-winning, creative agency as managing director.
Stink Studios
Stink Studios has hired five new executives: Najla Barance, head of people; Greg Benedetto, executive producer; Keith Jamerson, head of production; Ely Kim, group creative director; Alexis de Seve, director of client services; and Serene Wong, creative director.
Thinkingbox
Global creative collective Thinkingbox has appointed David Palmer as creative director and Jessica Luch as associate creative director, joining its Salt Lake City and Vancouver teams, respectively. Previously, Palmer held the role of creative director at both Axis 41 and Canopy and was director of UX/UI at Contravent.
Luch joins the Thinkingbox team from Pound & Grain, where she was art director for five years.
Two by Four
Independent, full-service agency Two by Four has named Jessica Romaniuk as its first-ever president of the Chicago office, while Amy Corbett has been promoted to director of client services. Annie Tsikretsis has been elevated to svp, director of production.
Romaniuk joined Two by Four in 2018 and was most recently vice president of media, social and public relations. In her new role, Romaniuk is responsible for the overall leadership of the Chicago office.
Corbett started as a junior account executive in 2013, quickly rising to account group director. In her new role, Corbett will oversee all client relationships and lead the account leadership department.
Tsikretsis joined the agency as director of production in 2015, was named vp in 2020 and has successfully led the financial growth of the production department.
VMLY&R
In a push to boost and unify media efforts across the network, VMLY&R has named Jennifer Kohl as executive director, head of U.S. media, and welcomed Chrissie Mealy as managing director, paid media.
Kohl has spent most of her career at WPP across media teams at BrandBuzz/GroupM before joining Y&R. With the merger of VML and Y&R in 2018, Kohl stepped up to lead the integrated VMLY&R media team in New York, Atlanta, Miami and Chicago as svp, executive director, integrated media. With her latest promotion, VMLY&R’s largest media office, Kansas City, also becomes part of her remit.
Mealy will lead the Kansas City media team and will continue to develop and grow it. She brings more than 20 years of media experience, most recently serving as vice president of media at Attane, formerly GlynnDevins. Previously she held positions at Applebee’s and Barkley.
Wellcom Worldwide
Wellcom Worldwide, an Innocean company, appointed David Bridges as its new group global president and CEO. Bridges undertakes the restructure and renewal of Wellcom Worldwide and will oversee the growth and strategic direction of all the Wellcom Brands, including thelab and Dippin’ Sauce.
Bridges previously served as president and CEO of thelab NYC, a digital ecommerce/content production agency.
Other executive appointments include: Max Oshman, promoted to CEO of thelab NYC; Valerie Anderson, new head of content for Wellcom Worldwide; Doug Guttenberg, promoted to managing director of the newly launched Wellcom USA; and Andrew Lumsden, promoted to CEO of Wellcom Australia/Asia.
WPP
WPP announced that its majority-owned subsidiary, Finsbury Glover Hering Corporation (Finsbury Glover Hering) and Sard Verbinnen & Co (SVC) have reached a merger agreement to create a strategic communications firm advising clients in navigating opportunities and challenges. The new firm will help clients achieve their business goals, with approximately 1,000 professionals operating from 25 offices in Asia, Europe, the Middle East and the United States, including its global headquarters in New York.
Senior professionals from Finsbury Glover Hering and SVC will lead the new company. The transaction is expected to complete in Q4 2021 and the combined company will operate under a new name starting in 2022.
Zeta
Zeta, a cloud-based marketing technology company has hired Matthew Mobley as executive vice president of technology strategy. Mobley will lead Zeta’s CRM technology strategy team advising customers on how best to leverage technology to meet their business goals. Most recently, he served as chief technology officer at Merkle, where he led the Americas technology services line.