Matt O’Rourke has joined advertising and marketing agency VIA, based in Portland, Maine, as chief creative officer. He will report to CEO Leeann Leahy and work with brands including Arm & Hammer, Klondike and Golden Corral.
“Matt is exactly the kind of creative leader this moment demands,” said Leahy. “He represents a new generation of creativity, one that understands how audiences behave, how media evolves, and how creative is expected to perform in the real world. Matt is the right leader for the future of our business because he knows that today’s most engaging and entertaining ideas must also be accountable, strategic, and commercially effective.”
O’Rourke joins VIA after co-founding SUPER SERIOUS and holding senior creative leadership roles across the agency landscape, including at Wieden+Kennedy, Crispin, Grey, and McCann. His work has been widely recognized by the industry, earning multiple Cannes Lions. He has led award-winning work for globally recognized brands including Old Spice, Volvo, Taco Bell, Burger King, Nintendo, and MasterCard, and has played a key creative role in multiple Super Bowl campaigns. His work consistently creates moments that break into culture and reshape how brands engage with people. A standout example is Old Spice’s “Muscle Music,” a playful, digitally driven activation that turned Terry Crews’ own muscles into musical instruments–an inventive collision of physical performance and technology that became a widely shared cultural moment.
At VIA, O’Rourke will be focused on elevating brands to irrational loyalty and inviting customers to be participants in value creation. He believes every medium has a role to play, but that modern creative leadership is about designing brand experiences people actively want to participate in; experiences that create long term value, not just short term attention.
“VIA has a clear understanding that creativity is a driver of growth, not an afterthought,” said O’Rourke. “From our first conversation, it was clear this is a team focused on making work people genuinely care about, work that shows up in culture, not just in campaigns. That ambition, and the moment VIA is in right now, made this an easy decision.”
