3 Dec 2007 Durham, NC
MCKINNEY CHANGES CREATIVE LEADERSHIP
McKinney announced today that David Baldwin has resigned his post as executive creative director at McKinney to seek a new challenge. His ten years as McKinney’s ECD mark a tenure exceeded only by the agency’s founder, the late Chick McKinney. During his run, the agency has seen significant growth, becoming an acknowledged leader in interactive and integrated communications.
Baldwin is a broadly-awarded talent whose personal recognition includes the Kelly Award for copywriting and eighteen One Show pencils. He joined McKinney in 1998 from Leonard/Monahan, where he was creative head and partner. Before Leonard/ Monahan, Baldwin trained at some of the best creative shops in the country, including Della Femina, Travisano & Partners, Hal Riney & Partners, Cole & Weber and Deutsch/NY.
David is currently Chairman of The One Club and a board member of The Creative Circus. He also led pants!, the McKinney band that twice won the Fluid Battle of the Ad Bands before winning the 2005 Fortune Corporate Battle of the Bands at the Rock ‘N’ Roll Hall of Fame.
McKinney Chairman and CEO Brad Brinegar said, "David has been a friend and partner since I joined the agency in 2002. He has made significant contributions to our success, and I wish him the very best. I know that he will make a huge difference wherever he chooses to take the next phase of his career."
"I've been at McKinney for 10 years now and I'm proud of the work we've done and how we've turned this agency into the agency it is today," said Baldwin. "But I'm also excited to explore all of the new opportunities there are for creative people in this new era, both inside and outside of advertising."
Jonathan Cude becomes the fifth creative head in McKinney’s 38-year history.
Cude, 39, joined McKinney in 2003 from Wieden + Kennedy, where he wrote for Nike and Diet Coke and was best known for Nike "Streaker," which Creativity named runner-up for best commercial of the year. At Wieden, he also showed he could handle a broad range of styles from the humor of "Streaker" to the inspiring drama of the 2003 Cannes Gold Lion winner, Nike "Before."
His ability to engage people with such focused, powerful ideas has been evident in his leadership at McKinney. He was co-creative director of the Audi A3 "Art of the Heist," Creativity Magazine’s 2005 Campaign of the Year and the most broadly awarded U.S. campaign of that year. He also led development of the Sony Bravia launch, "The World’s First TV for Men & Women," that helped propel Sony from also-ran to dominant leader in LCD Flat Panel TV.
Over the past four years, Cude’s teams have won a Cannes Lion, two One Show Pencils, an Andy, an Athena, two Yahoo! Creative Summit Purple Chairs, four IAB MIXX awards including the inaugural Best of Show, two Buzz Awards and three EFFIEs. He has most recently contributed to account wins that include Virgin Mobile USA and Coldwell Banker.
Cude said, "This job represents a tremendous opportunity for me. I am thrilled to be able to help lead McKinney into its next chapter. It’s an amazing time to be in this business, with the marketing landscape we navigate rapidly evolving and expanding. The one constant though – no matter where, when or how we communicate – is the power of creativity. It's the currency of our ideas that matters most."
McKinney’s Brinegar said, "Jonathan is a big talent and a big personality. He has the creative vision to drive McKinney’s creative product to new heights while helping fuel the agency’s leadership in turning campaigns into rich conversations."
McKinney is an advertising agency pioneering the industry in conversation planning, the art and science of building strong emotional and transactional connections between brands and the right people.
Founded in 1969, the Durham-based agency has created some of the most innovatively integrated marketing communications programs, including Audi of America’s Art of the Heist, Travelocity’s Roaming Gnome, the Polaris CEO Duel and the launch of the Sony Bravia LCD TV. McKinney’s clients include Brown-Forman’s Southern Comfort, Coldwell Banker, Major League Gaming, The NASDAQ Stock Market, Qwest Communications, Select Comfort, Travelocity, Virgin Mobile USA and Virgin Atlantic Airways. Two-time winner of the Yahoo! Creative Summit and one of the top EFFIE winning agencies for the past five years, McKinney’s work is also recognized by the Cannes Advertising Film Festival, the New York Andy Awards, the One Show and the Interactive Advertising Bureau’s MIXX Awards, among others.
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