Wavemaker Wins Adweek’s US Agency of The Year Award 2020

There are a lot of words that can be used to describe 2020. For Nancy Tortorella, Wavemaker’s U.S. chief client officer, one, in particular, comes to mind: “whiplash.”

“We went from clients wanting to very quickly pull back on dollars to wanting to reinvest and then wanting to be smart about understanding trends, media consumption and consumer behavior,” Tortorella says.

The frenzy came just as Wavemaker unveiled a new visual identity and “Positive provocation” rebrand. The rollout was March 12, just days before New York, home of the agency’s U.S. headquarters, went into lockdown.

The repositioning included practical changes, like a new operating system, but it also served as the basis for a new mindset at the agency, one that encouraged employees to challenge clients and old ways of thinking.

“We were in some ways so lucky that we launched it right before the pandemic,” says Amanda Richman, Wavemaker’s U.S. CEO. For Richman, the rebrand gave the agency a rallying cry to help it navigate the many challenges that came to define 2020.

Read more on Adweek’s website here.