March 2009
As grim economic news and soaring unemployment numbers dominate the headlines, Adrenalina, a leading advertising and marketing agency that is part of the MDC Partners network, is embarking on an ambitious plan to stimulate the marketplace by pumping up its branding and creative services and bulking up its staff.
Seeking to inject the ad industry with a much-needed shot of adrenaline, the shop is setting into motion a client-centric growth plan aimed at building an agency designed to meet the changing needs of existing and prospective clients as they redefine their own businesses in this ever-changing environment.
The agency's growth spurt is expected to create as many as 12 new jobs in key creative and branding posts throughout 2009 with several principal appointments.
"We've always envisioned being more than just an agency with clients," said Manuel Wernicky, Adrenalina's president, chief ideas officer and managing partner.
"We want to turn the industry on its head to provide clients with the authoritative intellect they expect to help shepherd, shape and lead their brands."
Adrenalina's strategic push comes as the shop positions agency personnel and its offerings in anticipation of a projected growth surge in 2050 when U.S. Hispanics, already the nation's largest minority, are expected to account for 30 per cent of Americans, as indicated by the U.S. Census Bureau.
"With another population shift approaching among U.S. Hispanics, breakthrough strategies offering relevant cultural ideas will be key to reaching savvy, multigenerational Latino consumers in the $1 trillion marketplace," said Wernicky.
"In anticipation of the 2010 Census, just one year away, we want to be the architects who are drafting the plans for a different kind of agency that guides businesses and brands, not just services them."
Wernicky added, "Marketers and brands will be best served in the future by shops that are cultivating and harvesting powerhouse talent who understand that our consumers no longer live in a world of traditional media that's just black and white."
On board to help lead and shape the agency's creative and strategic vision: "engagement, experience and emotion," are industry veterans Ivan Sanchez, who will serve as vice president, senior brand strategist, reporting to Wernicky; and Victor Zeiris, who joins as creative director, reporting to Paco Olavarrieta, chief creative director and managing partner.
The dual appointments help to bolster the agency's position in the marketplace as a branding and creative force with targeted industry and consumer insights leading all departments to better serve clients and consumers, said Wernicky.
In his new role as VP, senior brand strategist, Sanchez will oversee the agency's account planning department and be responsible for executing the agency's ethos, fueling the shop's new business strategy and providing insights and direction in the development of communications initiatives for existing and prospective agency clients.
Sanchez formerly served as brand planning director of GlobalHue Latino, New York, and prior to that was VP, account planning at Latinvox, which is now known as the Vox Collective, New York.
He has worked with clients including: Macy's, Verizon Wireless, General Motors, Coca-Cola, Sony, Gerber, Aiwa, The Partnership for a Drug Free America, Procter & Gamble, Chivas Regal, Stoli vodka, Remy Martin, and UNICEF among others.
As Adrenalina's creative director, Zeiris is charged with leading and managing all aspects of the agency's creative organization from concept development to the delivery of consumer-focused creative campaigns.
Zeiris is the former creative director of Euro RSCG Latino, where he spent 11 years overseeing creative teams for clients including DirecTV, Volvo, Sanofi-Aventis (Lantus), The Hartford, Walgreens and Chivas Regal.
For Adrenalina, the team's vision for growth comes one and a half years after the idea for the upstart agency was hatched when founders Wernicky and Olavarrieta joined forces and won Heineken USA's Tecate and Tecate Light U.S. Hispanic business in 2007 as part of an agency shootout and before the agency had even opened its doors.
As Tecate's lead agency, Adrenalina has successfully mounted separate national campaigns for the cervezas, including Tecate Light's first dual-language creative effort aimed at Hispanics in English and Spanish.
The marketing push with the tagline: ‘Tecate. Con Caracter’ (Tecate. With Character) so far has provided an adrenaline rush for Tecate, helping to fuel sales of the Mexican beer in an industry that remained flat last year and even as the economy began slowing in 2008. Tecate is the No. 4 import beer in the U.S., with an 8 per cent increase in shipments in 2007, according to Beer Marketer's Insights, West Nyack, N.Y.
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