J. Walter Thompson has a new chief creative officer in Toronto and a new senior creative team leading the Air Canada business.
Ryan Spelliscy, 36, who has been with JWT for three years and was most recently senior vice-president and executive creative director, has been promoted to chief creative officer.
“Ryan is a brilliant creative and a new breed of creative leader,” said Susan Kim-Kirkland, president and CEO, J. Walter Thompson Canada, in a release. “As one of the youngest chief creative officers in the world to lead a top agency, we know that he will continue to bring a fresh perspective to every aspect of our clients’ business.”
“Simply, the agency is where it is today because of Ryan leading the work on our most successful campaigns,” added Brent Choi, CCO New York and Canada. “Without question, he’s the best I’ve ever worked with.”
When Choi added the New York responsibilities in October he said at the time that Spelliscy would take the creative reins in Toronto.
Among the creative accomplishments in Spelliscy’s portfolio are “Better Tomorrows” for Sick Kids Foundation; #CanadaCarols for Air Canada; and “Dark Experiment” for Tim Hortons.
Meanwhile, former Leo Burnett creatives David Federico and Josh Budd also joined JWT in February as senior vice-president and creative directors to lead the Air Canada business. At Leo Burnett, they led the TD Bank business and won Best of the Best at the CMAs last fall for #TDThanksYou, a stunt (and subsequent viral video) that saw TD customers surprised with personalized thank-you gifts dispensed from a talking ATM.
The changes are just two of several made to the creative team in recent weeks and months. Those changes include:
- Laurent Abesdris joined JWT as associate creative director to lead the Hotels.com business along with Denise Cole who was promoted to associate creative director; and
- Lisa McCoy was hired as design director, while Rasna Jaswal was promoted to design director.
