Dedicated to building meaningful American brands with cultural relevance, Havas Chicago has hired creative powerhouse John Norman as chief creative officer to help advance its mission. A celebrated industry veteran who has worked with trendsetting brands such as Walmart, Nike, Coca-Cola and Gatorade, Norman brings a world-class level of advertising expertise combined with a profound respect for culture. He also has a deep understanding of working with some of America’s best and biggest brands to prepare them for a modern world.
“The Chicago office of Havas Creative North America plays a unique role in our creative agency portfolio—one that is passionate about modern creativity on modern platforms and determined to find new and interesting ways to blend the craft of storytelling with the power of culture,” said Paul Marobella, Chairman and CEO, Havas Creative North America. “Our goal in hiring a CCO was to seek a top talent—a respected and award-winning executive who is also a good fit for this mission. John’s experience and work speaks for itself, as he’s led creative for some of the world’s best agencies and managed creative teams for some of the most iconic advertising in the recent past. He will be an incredible addition to the Chicago office, the Havas creative team in North America and the local Chicago creative community.”
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With more than 25 years of visual storytelling experience in advertising and design, Norman arrives at Havas Chicago after nearly five years at Translation, where he served as chief creative officer and partner. During his tenure at Translation, Norman played an important role in building and introducing a companywide multidisciplinary model that fostered greater agility in a changing industry landscape. Prior to this, he worked as CCO at The Martin Agency, TBWA\Chiat\Day and Wieden+Kennedy—the latter being where he launched and led Coca-Cola’s “Open Happiness” campaign and the “Happiness Factory” franchise of spots; many World Cup campaigns, including the groundbreaking “Write the Future” work for Nike; and the prestigious “+HP” campaign. Before his agency roles, Norman worked in design at Nike and Benetton Group.
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As CCO of Havas Chicago, Norman will oversee creative development for the agency’s roster of brands, including Hefty, Reynolds, Orbitz, Moen, Mike’s Hard Lemonade, Cracker Barrel and more. He is charged with delivering creative content that makes an impactful difference to these brands and their consumers through data-driven storytelling on modern platforms. Norman will also play an instrumental role in bringing to life the North American Creative Group’s positioning of being the most meaningful partner to the modern CMO.
“I am beyond thrilled to join Paul and the Havas Chicago Village,” said Norman. “The agency’s relentless pursuit to help American brands find their voice in a modern world is a perfect fit for my design-thinking approach for solving creative and business challenges. My goal is to build upon Havas Chicago’s heritage as an unconventional agency—from the art on the walls to the people to what we do—and use the power of hybrid storytelling to create ideas with simple human truths, told with provocative single-minded narratives across all media channels. Havas has built the assets and cultivated the culture; curating and connecting the dots will be the focus.”
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