Cundari has hired a new leader for its digital team, bringing on Angie Kramer as VP of digital and innovation.
A newly-created role, Kramer will be tasked with leading and growing Cundari’s digital practice, as well as spearheading the strategic direction for the agency when it comes to innovation going forward. Jenn Steinmann, EVP and managing director at Cundari, points to the agency’s place on UK’s Directory Ranking of sixth of global digital agencies and two spots on the Warc 100 in 2014, saying digital work is something the agency is looking to stay on the cutting edge of as it earns more recognition for it, inside and outside of Canada.
“The campaigns that are showing up really comes out of things like the SickKids PainSquad app and our BMW videos, so I think there’s a lot of traction and spotlight on the work we’re doing in that space,” she says. “Even if you forget all the back-end stuff and builds we’re doing, we’ve had a level of recognition and traction with our innovation work, so Angie has a big mandate to continue that momentum and infuse our solutions with as much innovation as our clients allow.”
Cundari has had a VP of digital position in the past, though the “innovation” part of that role is new. Steinmann says that part of Kramer’s mandate will include bringing more “vision and rigour” to Cundari’s R&D work, something that has been evolving into a full innovation lab at the agency.
Kramer brings 20 years of experience to the role, having had digital leadership positions with agencies, clients and startups. Most recently the founder of freelancer recruiting platform JobBliss, Kramer was also VP of strategy, digital and analytics at Aimia and a creative director in charge of digital at Isobar and Capital C.
“The idea is to look at something and be agnostic in determining your solution, and [Kramer] has creative in her background, digital, strategy, CRM and customer loyalty,” Steinmann says. “I just think she comes with such a diverse skill set, she’ll be someone that will allow us to get ahead on the innovation front, no matter what path we need to take to get there.”
In February, Cundari’s managing director of digital Adrian Capobianco left for the president position at Proximity Canada. On the creative side, three of the agency’s creative leaders have left this year, with group CD Brian Murray taking the lead of DS+P’s creative department as CD, group CD Cory Eisentraut taking a VP, creative director position at Havas and CCO Andrew Simon taking the ECD position at Edelman Canada.
Steinmann says the agency will have new additions to its creative team in the near future, something she says it has been able to take their time with and find the right people for the position due to the strength of the rest of its staff, much like the search for Kramer, which began in February. In the spring, the agency also boosted its account team with five new hires and six promotions.
