Stephen Krauss has joined The Wonderful Company in Los Angeles as its chief creative officer after 13 years with Grey New York.
For those who need a (re)introduction, Wonderful was formerly known as Roll Global, and it essentially serves as a holding company for the varied interests of investors Stewart and Lynda Resnick. They’ve been described as “agricultural royalty,” and they currently own POM, FIJI Water, Wonderful Pistachios and other such nuts, a couple of wine companies and several other brands. (This is a pretty interesting profile if you’re curious.)
In the new role, Krauss will be CCO of Wonderful Agency, described as “the in-house, full-service advertising and marketing agency at The Wonderful Company…dedicated to creative excellence across all media.” He will report directly to Michael Perdigao, who has been with Wonderful since 2007 and now serves as its president of advertising and corporate communications.
The release tells us Krauss will be “proactively conceiving and executing campaigns, concepts and strategies” for the company’s all the company’s clients or brands. He will also aspire to thought leader status in ensuring that all Wonderful brands lead their respective markets.
Perdigao had this to say about the hire: “Steve has developed some truly memorable campaigns, and his talents will be put to good use, helping us craft innovative, effective communication solutions for our high-quality, healthy brands.” In a statement, Krauss cited the company’s “wide range of products” and his plans to create “breakthrough work” for all of them.
We don’t know what that work will look like, but in the case of POM it will probably not include specific health claims related to things like heart disease, prostate cancer and erectile dysfunction: last week the FTC shot down the company’s attempts to appeal a Supreme Court decision labeling such language “misleading.”
During his decade-plus with Grey, Krauss helped develop the E*TRADE baby and worked on the gun store stunt and the Canon account, among others. He was previously an art director at JWT. Krauss’s departure from Grey follows that of fellow ECD Ari Halper, who is now CCO at FCB New York–and while we hear that many of the agency’s current leaders were brought on by departed CCO Tor Myhren in an attempt to build up the team that would eventually replace him, the agency’s New York office has hired and promoted quite a few ECDs in recent months including Stephen Fogel and Doug Fallon of DirecTV, João Coutinho and Marco Pupo and Matt O’Rourke of Volvo.
So what does the CCO at such a company do? From the LinkedIn job listing, which will soon disappear:
“A master curator. You always have a unique point view and can lead others to break new ground. You speak planning and strategy as fluently as design, copy and art direction. You are flawless in your presentation skills and are an expert at reading a room. You are a minister of culture.”
This sounds familiar.
Krauss will also be tasked with “win[ning] industry recognition for our clients and the agency” in addition to “actively engag[ing] in recruitment and other HR activities” and “independently work[ing] and manag[ing] a team with little to no supervision from your manager.” We read all this as “no new business pitches,” and given the fact that the clients are all owned by the same holding company it sounds like a pretty sweet deal.
