McCann starts a design practice as brands seek more guidance

Former Mother Design exec Matt van Leeuwen will be the design division’s U.S. lead.

Aug 3, 2022 - 21:01

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McCann starts a design practice as brands seek more guidance

McCann has launched its own design practice called McCann Design, which includes a team of 50 employees across its New York, London and Toronto offices. While McCann has had design expertise, this is the first time the network is specifically building out a dedicated design practice.

This comes as design becomes a growing need for brands and McCann has seen an increase in design needs from clients.

Building blocks

McCann New York has recruited Matt van Leeuwen to lead the new practice hub in the U.S. He previously spent five years as creative director at Mother Design in New York where he worked on brands such as Dave & Buster’s, Tripadvisor, Target, Park Lane Hotel and Cadillac. Prior to that, he was a design principal at Interbrand New York. He joins Lisa Carrana, head of design for McCann London, and the design team in Toronto, led by Josh Stein, chief creative officer, McCann Canada.

“We have more and more clients coming to us to talk about design both more holistically, but also in terms of how they show up in the world,” said Chris Macdonald, chairman and CEO of McCann. “During the pandemic, a lot of brands have had to become infinitely better with their internal audiences. Like ‘How do I talk to my own employees.’ So that whole world of design and the brand design and how the brand shows up in the world externally and internally has become increasingly important. Not surprisingly, we have a lot of design people around the world, but what we've never done is boil them together, both as a practice and as a community.”

Macdonald also mentioned that clients have viewed the IPG network, which McCann is part of, in a “very traditional design way,” and said this launch should help dispel that. Beyond product and packaging design, the practice will also focus on motion and 3D animation. These areas have grown in importance as brands continue to place a larger emphasis on digital work.

An emphasis on digital

“What's happening now is that smart ad agencies have seen that it's really design that drives relevance, it's design that endures, it's design that builds equity, and design that pays off bigger in the long run,” Brain Collins, co-founder of design agency Collins said, welcoming the added competition in the industry.

Jason Velliquette, executive VP of digital at R3, said the two areas he's seen expanding the fastest are CX Design and 3D Design.

“The ecommerce boom boosted by the pandemic, the rise of DTC brands, the push for more first-party data, and the need to better connect with consumers via personalized experiences have all contributed to this growing need for CX Design,” Velliquette said. “Product design, service design and UX design are all now overlapping and intersecting with one another. This may be what is fueling agencies to start touting and boosting their design disciplines.”

McCann is the latest in a series of agencies putting an increased emphasis on design. Last month, WPP merged two of its design shops, Design Bridge and Superunion, to form Design Bridge and Partners. Also last month, Minneapolis-based agency Periscope launched a design practice called Favorite Child. In May, Boston-based agency Colossus merged with design studio A&Co to bolster its design offering. Even agencies that specialize in design have been focused on boosting their capabilities, such as Work & Co, which in April acquired Presence, a company that specializes in digital products including metaverse work.

According to Velliquette, every agency R3 has talked to in the past nine months “has had some sort of metaverse solution they are pushing.”

“With the rise of AR/VR/MR [augmented, virtual, and mixed reality] and the metaverse, many companies are also now turning to their agencies to help them launch or express their brands across gaming platforms and virtual worlds,” Velliquette said. “Winning in the metaverse isn’t going to happen by slapping your 2D banner ad on a 3D virtual billboard. The companies who are winning with consumers in the metaverse are evolving their brand identities with 3D avatars, immersive worlds, interactive experiences, along with virtual goods, wearables and collectibles, and more.”

People in high demand include 3D modelers, designers, animators and architects as brands seek out the right partners to help them navigate “virtualized marketing,” he said.

“Old style brand identity firms are not relevant anymore unless they have figured out that most brands and experiences take place in a digital world that is not static,” said Catherine Bension, CEO of SelectResources International added.

Another aspect of design that van Leeuwen has seen traction in is “multisensory design.”

“When I think of the brands of the future, it’s not just about great-looking campaigns or logos anymore, but the full experience,” van Leeuwen said. “I love the idea of bringing in touch, sound and sight to work. New technologies are giving us the ability to create unique worlds where we can tap into all of these senses.”

Moving forward, Macdonald says McCann will be able to differentiate its design practice from specialty agencies because it can simplify the process since it already works on brand strategy for clients.

“Let's carry that through, don't hand it off,” Macdonald said. “Make sure that your brand is really being cared for and crafted through every channel and through every medium. That doesn't mean design companies won't exist and do amazing work. I think that we will call them in for their specialty [as needed].”