Patrick Scissons named CCO, will work on Diageo accounts
Grey Canada is set to acquire Birthplace, a Toronto-based digital-leaning creative agency. Birthplace founder Patrick Scissons has been named chief creative officer.
The acquisition does not include BMG (Birthplace Management Group), Birthplace’s Vancouver-based gaming arm, which will continue on as an independent company. The remaining 20 Birthplace staffers began moving to Grey’s new Toronto offices on Thursday afternoon.
Stephanie Nerlich, who became Grey’s president in March, has been looking for a lead creative executive as part of an effort to revitalize the company.
“I talked to fabulous people in [Toronto] and lots of people I love partnering with, but nobody really stood out,” Nerlich said. “They didn’t have what I was thinking about, which was the new media frontier. Everybody had been siloed for way too long, through no fault of their own… Or they were a really amazing talent, but digital only.”
Nerlich had approached Scissons three years ago when she was president of Toronto agency Lowe Roche, but Scissons was unable to join as he was then only starting Birthplace.
After four years with BBDO Canada, Scissons launched Birthplace in 2009 as a semi-independent partner to Syncapse, a digital and social media development company founded by Michael Scissons, Patrick’s brother. After becoming fully independent two years ago, Birthplace has gone on to work with clients including Post Foods Canada and U.S., the Toronto Port Authority, CBC and Walt Disney.
Scissons said he was not actively looking for a buyer for his agency, but was approached by Nerlich a second time after she took over as Grey president in March.
“This wasn’t something I was actively looking for, but when the opportunity presented itself… it made a lot of sense to get me back to using what I’d learned over the last couple of years on a slightly larger stage and in a more holistic [agency].”
Terms of the acquisitions were not disclosed.
Scissons takes over the position formerly held by Carl Jones, who has enrolled at OCAD University.
Grey recently won accounts with Diageo and is working on Guinness’ first Canadian brand marketing campaign, as well as global Ketel One vodka assignments.
