Adholics has announced the growth of its team with three senior hires from GroupM and The Media Store.
The new appointments come after the independent media agency secured six new client wins including global insurance brand Gallagher and Melbourne-based organic food manufacturer Pana Organic.
Stephen Benrad joins Adholics as head of growth and operations from The Media Store where he held the role of commercial director. Benrad’s appointment follows client-side roles at Kraft Heinz and Jetstar as well as agency roles at MediaCom and Carat.
Also joining from The Media Store, where he led the Simply Energy and RMIT accounts, is Rob Shaw who has been appointed group account director. Shaw joins Adholics with a mix of global and independent agency experience including Starcom and Blue 449.
Georgia Urquhart-Hay has been appointed programmatic and digital campaign manager at Adholics and was previously with Group M where she led campaigns for clients including BUPA and Mondelez.
Adholics agency director, Jake O’Donnell said the recruitment reflects the agency’s vision to attract the best talent in market to match the calibre of clients Adholics has added.
“Stephen is an experienced media practitioner who has an outstanding record of success growing clients and teams alike. We welcome him to the Adholics family and look forward to him growing our operations and capabilities to attract a high quality of talent and clients,” O’Donnell said.
“Rob has a wealth of experience across both multinational and independent agency environments. His knowledge of existing and emerging media platforms will be of huge benefit to our growing cohort of clients. Georgia is one of the smartest minds in programmatic media and we are excited to see her building the agency’s capabilities to the benefit of our growing roster of performance orientated clients,” he added.
Benrad said of his new role: “The opportunity to build on the momentum Jake has created in such a short space of time is something that couldn’t be ignored. I look forward to growing the capabilities and operations of Adholics to ensure we attract the very best talent and clients alike.”
Urquhart-Hay commented: “I’m excited to be joining Adholics at a time of rapid growth, working with a very talented team of people and clients who I can share my skills and experiences with.”
Shaw added: “Adholics is an agency that has big ambitions and a culture that is attracting a fantastic calibre of clients. I look forward to working closely with the team to continue to improve and innovate our offering.”
The appointments are effective immediately.
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Top image left to right: Georgia Urquhart-Hay, Rob Shaw, Stephen Benrad