BBDO names new chief creative officers for North America and New York

As the industry creeps back toward normal, BBDO is fortifying its ranks with the appointment of two key leaders in North America. Luiz Sanches, chairman and chief creative officer at Almap BBDO in Brazil, steps up to the post of North America chief creative officer while Matt MacDonald, who last served as executive VP, group executive creative director, becomes creative chief of BBDO New York.

Sanches moves into the new role after more than 25 years at Almap, one of the most celebrated agencies in the BBDO network. Under his leadership, the agency has created numerous notable campaigns for clients including Havaianas, Audi and Volkswagen and won four Agency of the Year honors at the Cannes Lions. In 2020, Alma was named the festival’s Agency of the Decade alongside BBDO Worldwide, which earned Network of the Decade. Sanches has relocated to New York for the role but will also continue his chairman and chief creative officer duties at Almap.

MacDonald moves once again into an agency chief creative officer role after serving in the post previously at JWT New York. In 2014, he joined BBDO as exec VP, group executive creative director and was also chief creative officer for parent Omnicom on AT&T, overseeing teams across New York, Los Angeles, Atlanta, Dallas and Calgary. In 2021, he helped BBDO win The Home Depot business.  

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Bringing it

“I’ve worked with Luiz and Matt for a long time now; they represent the very best of our industry and, specifically, our continued mission to innovate for our clients’ success,” said BBDO Worldwide Global Chief Creative Officer David Lubars in a statement. “Their complementary strengths will undeniably benefit not only their teams and the agency, but the creative output we deliver day in and day out. Luiz and Matt are both inspiring, modern leaders who know how to bring it, and bring it they will.”

In their new roles, Sanches and MacDonald will work in lockstep alongside Lubars to elevate and evolve the agency’s creative product across the region and at the agency's New York headquarters. “There’s no way you could lead North America without New York, but we also have different flavors around the agencies we have in San Francisco, Atlanta, Minneapolis, Chicago,” said Sanches. “Once we have the mothership [set], all the agencies will benefit from that and vice versa. Collaboration will be key for our success.”

For New York specifically, “purely selfishly, I want to be the best office in the best creative network in the world,” MacDonald said. “We’ve got a lot of competition just inside the network, but we’ve been there before and I have no doubt that we will be there again.”

The promotions mark a turning point for BBDO following the trials of the past two years. Early on during the pandemic, the agency laid off two of its key execs, former New York Chief Creative Officer Greg Hahn, who went on to open his own agency, Mischief @ No Fixed Address to much success, and Exec VP-Director of Integrated Production Dave Rolfe, who later joined WPP as global head of production.

Big shoes to fill

“That first year of the pandemic was really hard for everybody and those moments were awful,” said MacDonald. “Greg’s are really big shoes to fill, and there’s also those of David Lubars and [AMV BBDO’s] David Abbott and Alex Grieve. That’s the legacy we have to live up to.”

That said, big wins such as The Home Depot have given BBDO new momentum “and they’re changing the agency and the kind of work that we’re doing,” MacDonald said. 

A number of new hires at the agency over the last year or so are also bringing "a lot of fresh energy and now that we’re—knock on wood—coming out on the other side of this pandemic, I feel really good about where we’re going,” MacDonald added.

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Some of that energy, of course, will be coming from Sanches himself. “In South America, we’re very well known for doing a lot with just a little,” he said. “How can we go even bigger with the opportunities we have here?”  A musician who plays guitar, Sanches also draws a comparison between advertising and jazz. “You have a standard, but jazz brings in different voices, different ways of what people are used to playing,” he said. That’s a differentiation in terms of business. Creativity can be in every single point of contact and that’s what I want to bring to the U.S.”