David&Goliath has put a new leadership team in place, promoting ECD Bobby Pearce to managing partner, chief creative officer, and bringing longtime Leo Burnett strategist Wells Davis into the fold as managing partner, chief strategy officer. Pearce and Davis will replace CCO Colin Jeffery and CSO Seema Miller, respectively, who, along with D&G chief digital officer Mike Geiger, have resigned to pursue another venture.
The two new managing partners will work alongside D&G founder/chairman David Angelo and D&G president, Brian Dunbar.
“Bobby has been with us for over a year now and has proven himself time and time again to be a leader,” said Angelo. “He took over the Jack In the Box account and immediately earned the respect of the client and staff during a very challenging transition.”
Prior to D&G, Pearce spent time at McCann’s M:United NYC as SVP/executive creative director. Before that, he ran his own agency, Van Winkle Pearce in Atlanta, for three years. While there, as CCO/partner he oversaw all creative and new business, doubling the agency’s size in less than two years with new business wins such as Hilton’s Homewood Suites, Home2Suites, Ancestry.com and Moda Tequila. Pearce has also held leadership roles at agencies including BBDO Atlanta, where he was EVP/CCO; Fallon Minneapolis, Fallon NY, Goodby Silverstein & Partners and Carmichael Lynch. He’s worked on such brands as Holiday Inn, Holiday Inn Express, AT&T, Citibank, Saturn, BMW, Toyota, Goodyear, Budweiser and Microsoft.
Wells Davis
A strategist with over 25 years’ experience, Davis was most recently EVP, head of strategy at Leo Burnett. While there, he helped develop the strategy for the lauded Coca-Cola campaign, “Small World Machines,” which earned nine Cannes Lions at the 2013 Cannes Festival. The initiative created a connection between people of India and Pakistan by providing a live communications portal that allowed people to complete a task, like touching hands, together. Davis’ previous agency experience includes MacLaren McCann Toronto, TAXI, TBWA Toronto and Saatchi & Saatchi, where he worked on and led strategy for brands like Coca-Cola, McDonald’s, Taco Bell, Wendy’s, Toyota, MINI, Nike, Nintendo, Samsung, Sprint and Kellogg’s.
In recent months, D&G has made a number of key hires and promotions including Gustavo Sarkis, an award-winning ECD for Kia; Judson Whigham, a managing director for Jack In The Box; Kristen Knape, promoted to group planning director and appointed director of philanthropy; and D&G’s new chief marketing officer, Stephen Larkin. In addition, D&G plans to elevate more senior members who have played a huge role in the agency’s success. Those promotions, along with a few more new hires, will be announced in the coming weeks.
