Rick Evans

Brand Strategy & Marketing Leader / Creating actionable brands and brand actions that drive resonance and growth.

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Senior brand strategy and marketing leader with 17 years translating business, category, and cultural insights into strategies that create resonance and drive growth. My experience includes both leadership positions in strategy on the agency side and marketing on the brand side.From a Cannes Lions-winning campaign developed in three hours to reimagining the membership platform of a global retailer for 100M+ customers - I deliver both short term creative impact and sustained strategic value.Currently available for remote leadership roles and consulting projects while seeking the right Brand Strategy or Marketing leadership opportunity. Known for quickly becoming a trusted C-suite advisor (clients consistently extend engagements).Expertise: Brand strategy, Cultural strategy, Integrated marketing, Partnership marketing, Consumer insights, Membership & loyalty strategy, Sustainability & circular economy, Creative collaboration, Team leadershipBrands Supported: Visa (EMEA), American Express, Barclays, IKEA, Airbnb (EMEA), Dove, Unliever, Bayer, YouTube, Andreseen Horowitz, McDonald's, Sanderson Design Group, Ben & Jerry's, ASICS, Cazadores Tequila, Michelin, (RED), STA TravelAgencies Collaborated With: R/GA (UK), Ogilvy (UK), Saatchi & Saatchi (UK), 20(SOMETHING) (UK), OLIVER (US), Day One Agency (US), Virtue (Vice Media - US)Honors Earned: Cannes Gold Lion in Creative Effectiveness for #TurnYourBack↓, PR Week Most Innovative CommunicatorFind out how I can help↓ your brand or client.

Select Work

Brand Creation
*Unilever Step Zero↓
*Archive by SDG↓
*Barclays Avios Rewards↓

Brand Actions
*Dove #TurnYourBack↓
*a16z Community↓
*Apps for (RED)↓

Campaigns
*Harlequin↓
*Barclays Int. Banking'↓
*Tequila Cazadores↓

Strategy & Analysis
*IKEA Family Membership↓
*Airbnb Audience Analysis↓
*Dove AI Perspective↓

The Work

Client: Airbnb
Agency: Direct Contract
Role: Brand Marketing Strategy LeadChallenge: Airbnb is a U.S.-based business that grew by focusing on one country. To grow in Europe, leadership needed to understand the nuances of Guest audiences across the diverse European markets the brand is active in.Strategy: Created one source of truth bringing together multiple sources of data to give marketing leadership real insight into the differences and similarities amongst European guests.Result: New insight brought efficiencies in advertising creation and media spend.

Client: Dove
Agency: Ogilvy
Role: Strategy DirectorChallenge: Dove is an iconic brand for its stance on real beauty. Does it need to shift in the age of artificial intelligence?Output: With deep research including talking with industry experts and stakeholders across WPP, I developed the first Ogilvy point of view for the brand on the potential impact of artificial intelligence on its brand strategy, marketing and advertising.Result: Deep insight and understanding of the artificial intelligence and brand landscape to inform future brand strategy and campaigns.

Client: Dove
Agency: Ogilvy
Role: Strategy DirectorChallenge: Dove's longstanding commitment to champion real beauty was challenged by a TikTok filter that made it hard to figure out what was actually real.Strategy: Counter the prevailing trend through grassroots influencers and TikTok beauty community users before bringing in celebrities.Result:The campaign saw an increase in purchase intent and brand trust in the U.S. and UK. It also picked up a Media Grand Prix and Gold in Creative Effectiveness at Cannes Lions.View the Case Study Video↗

Client: Unilever Sustainability
Agency: Ogilvy
Role: Strategy DirectorChallenge: Product innovation can only get global conglomerates so far to sustainability goals, how do we change public behavior?Approach: Create a brand to aggregate collective action across social media that helps people realize that the most important step happens before the first step.Strategy: Seed influencers around the world and across categories with tips for sustainable living hacks backed by Ogilvy Behavioral Science to develop content from.Result: On the path to reaching 1B people with tips and tricks to live more sustainably.View the Step Zero Website↗

Client: Visa EMEA
Agency: Saatchi & Saatchi
Role: Strategy DirectorChallenge: As the world's largest payment network, almost everyone has a Visa credit or debit card but nobody actually engages Visa directly. How can we get more people to trust Visa directly?Strategy: Recognizing that Visa is essentially a marketplace for transactions with multiple stakeholders, we built a new trust framework based on digital-first marketplace products like Airbnb.Result: Visa EMEA's CMO onboarded a new approach to trust across his brand's work.

Client: Andressen Horowitz
Agency: R/GA
Role: Strategy DirectorChallenge: How do you create a valuable first-of-its kind online/offline, invite-only community for everyone from tech founders to cultural creators?Strategy: Through stakeholder interviews and workshops with a16z partners and portfolio companies, we uncovered that importance of psychological safety. This informed the entire project from interaction design and platform to key messages and communication cadence.Result: Client made referrals for future work from its investment portfolio.

Client: IKEA (Ingka Group)
Agency: R/GA
Role: Strategy DirectorChallenge: How can we reimagine the IKEA Family membership program to create more value for the many people while feeling more IKEA?Approach: Meeting with the many people inside and outside of IKEA to map the current value system and understand what opportunities existed to enhance it and bring IKEA's brand to every interaction and offer.Strategy: Pursue interactions, benefits and rewards that create relationship value for IKEA and its customers, rather than just a transactional discount.Result: Heavily influenced roadmap for new sustainability and rewards programs.

Client: Sanderson Design Group
Agency: EveryFriday
Role: Strategy DirectorChallenge: How can we monetize the famous William Morris design archive without cannibalizing our existing portfolio of brands?Strategy: Our insight focused on how young urban renters doesn’t value vintage because of its origin, but its ability to create something unique in a modern context. We compressed time in this fashion to join the past and the present, recognizing the timelessness of good design. There is no start, middle or end, just a cycle of imagination, interpretation and creation.Result: New brand created (foundation, naming, visual identity) in a matter of weeks that launched at Selfridges in London.Watch the Social Film↗

Client: Sanderson Design Group
Agency: EveryFriday
Role: Strategy DirectorChallenge: Sanderson owned Harlqeuin was experiencing a notable sales decline and adding a direct to consumer channel.Strategy: As one of the boldest brands in the portfolio, we revamped Harlequin's positioning to speak to fashionable people who also want a fashionable home.Result: "Over time, Harlequin lost some of its magic. This creative campaign is boldly re-building the brand." - Nigel Hunt, CMO

Client: Barclays
Agency: EveryFriday
Role: Strategy DirectorChallenge: How does the first ever current account with travel awards in the UK work, what is it called and how do we bring it market in the middle of a global pandemic preventing travel?Strategy: By focusing on the people and emotions of travel, rather than the transaction of points for hotels and flights - from seeing places to seeing faces - we were able to make a detailed, transactional offering as human as possible from the rewards structure to the naming and identity.Result: Opened up new streams of work across the Barclays business to support marketing with brand architecture, brand refreshes and creative communications.

Client: Barclays
Agency: EveryFriday
Role: Strategy DirectorChallenge: Despite its global recognition, Barclays was not seen as a global player for individual customers when it comes to International Banking.Strategy: Through interviews with key stakeholders and a deep understanding of the intended audience, we found that we needed to shift the feeling of Barclays International Banking being the dead weight in the process, to an enabler that actually makes things happen.Result: The campaign overdelivered across the board by as much as 600% against key performance indicators.

Client: Bayer
Agency: Oliver
Role: Strategy DirectorChallenge: Bayer created a new functional health supplement that used natural ingredients in combinations to address real human health challenges. But it is also a brand known for its chemical creations.Strategy: We created a brand (foundation, visual identity) that looks more at home in a natural food store than a pharmacy, focused on the audiences and lifestyles where the functional solutions would be most relevant.Result: The new brand generated enough excitement to get CVS on board as a launch partner with premium shelf space.

Client: Tequila Cazadores (Barcardi)
Agency: Virtue (Vice Media)
Role: Assoc. Strategy DirectorChallenge: How do you relaunch a product in a hot tequila category full of celebrity endorsers and owners?Strategy: Shine a light on the celebrities of Los Altos de Jalisco. With editorial video and images, we made the people and the place that make Tequila Cazadores what it is our celebrities with an integrated marketing strategy and plan including social media, out of home, experiential and online video.Result: Double digit sales growth over the first two years of the campaign.Watch a Campaign Film↗

Brand: (RED)
Role: Director of MarketingChallenge: (RED) was built on special edition physical products being purchased triggering a donation. How does it work with increasingly popular in-app purchases?Strategy: In partnership with Apple, we worked with 25 of the top app developers to create in-app purchases with 100% of the proceeds going to (RED). The key to marketing was to let the developers, who know their audience best, lead the marketing for their app and audience.Result: Tens of millions of dollars raised on World AIDS Day 2014.

Kind Words

“Rick is not only a great strategist, he is a fundamentally good human. He is able to go from helping rebrand the Grizzly Bear, so we have a greater appreciation for the animal in the wild, through to helping IKEA unpick and remap what the future of membership looks like. He is a strong team leader and collaborator. I would bring him onto any project and know my colleagues and clients are in great hands.”
- Nicole Armstrong, ex-Executive Strategy Director at R/GA, Current Executive Strategy Director at Clemenger BBDO"The simplifier - if I have to give a persona to Rick it will be it. I believe a strategist should be here to get the noise and complexity of an organisation/brand and take the essence of it all to give the brand a clear path forward. While working together, Rick has consistently done it for global retailer (IKEA), Global FMCG brand (Unilever), Global QSR (McDonald's) and Highly connected VC (A16Z). And he is bringing every discipline along with him, and for me and the brands we partner with, a strong and indispensable strategic partner."
- Bertrand Morin, Client Partner at R/GA“Endorsing Rick. He's very good, and comfortable with big brands and clutch situations.”
- Tom Morton, Ex-R/GA Global Chief Strategy Officer

"I brought Rick on to lead the brand planning and campaign strategy for one of my biggest clients and he overdelivered in every aspect of his scope. His collaboration with our agency team, the clients many different stakeholders, and the IAT from day one was beyond what we had expected from him. Rick approaches everything with well-researched strategic insights, considers industry trends, and has expertise in culture that you can't find elsewhere."
- Matt Scapelliti, ex-Group Account Director at OLIVER, Current Freelance Executive Producer"Rick is an experienced strategist whose insights often draw from a deep understanding of nature, inspiring how he approaches challenges for some of the world’s biggest brands. He also excels in creating comprehensive strategies that are rooted in research and aligned with the ambition of the brand. Rick is not only a brilliant strategist but also a dedicated mentor and team player. His encouragement and support fostered a collaborative, healthy challenger-mentality environment. Rick's blend of systems thinking, nature-inspired thinking, and mentorship made a significant impact on our work at R/GA."
- Yuliana Safari, Principal at Ipsos Strategy3, ex-Associate Director at R/GA

Education and Courses

BA, Journalism and Mass Communication
University of North Carolina - Chapel HillCertificates
*INSIDE LVHM, Fundamental Principles of Luxury
*Google AI Essentials with Coursera
*Adaptive Resilience, Search Inside Yourself Leadership InstituteCourses
*LinkedIn Inclusive Leadership
*Transformation of the Global Food System, University of Copenhagen/Coursera
*Business Sustainability in the Circular Economy, University of London/Coursera
*Sustainable Vikings: Sustainability and Corporate Social Responsibility in the Nordics, Copenhagen Business School/Coursera
*Blue Ocean Strategy, General Assembly
*Introduction to Product Management, General Assembly
*Programming for Non-Programmers, General Assembly

Writing

Is the Ad Industry Losing Its Focus on People?
Muse By CliosIn a Fast World, We Need More Slow Brands
CampaignCan marketing be circular?
WARC3 Ways to Make Your Brand More Human
Muse by CliosBeing Human as a Brand Strategy
Muse by Clios

Creative Outlets

I believe that to change the tide of the climate crisis, we must reconcile our relationship with the Earth and all of its inhabitants.In this spirit, I created the Ecosystem Member podcast to explore the relationships a range of people have with the more-than-human world and how they bring that to their life and work.Past guests include Vincent Stanley, the legendary director of philosophy at Patagonia, Ersin Han Ersin, of the art collective Marshmallow Laser Feast, and Lylianna Allala, Climate Justice Director at the City of Seattle.Listen On:
Apple Podcasts↗
Spotify↗
YouTube↗
Website↗

Scientists and experts assign about 30% of global greenhouse gas emissions to our food system. With many people in the West eating three or more times a day, that's a lot of chances to choose a more environmentally responsible diet.On You Can't Eat Money, I interviewed food industry folks from award-winning and Michelin Star chefs such as Dan Barber, Sean Sherman and Douglas McMaster to food thought leaders like Ben Aguilar of The (Wendell) Berry Center and Melina Shannon-DiPietro of MAD, Rene Redzepi's culinary industry non-profit about the connection between nature, ourselves and our food system.Listen On:
Apple Podcasts↗
Spotify↗
YouTube↗

Cannes Lions Live 2020At the start of the COVID-19 lockdown, one of my mentors introduced me to the idea of biomimicry.While I came across many resources that applied biomimicry to design and materials, there was nothing about more general business and cultural strategy - so I created something.Along with an amazing group including a creative director, artist and a leader in the design futures space, we created a panel for Cannes Lions Live and shared the wonders of nature and how it can inform our creative practices.Watch on LoveTheWork.com↗

Assignment PhotographerBefore moving to London in 2020, I had a chance to join my wife on a research trip to Côte d'Ivoire as a photographer.In addition to taking portraits of the weavers as the collective my wife was working with, I got a chance to snap these artists in action.A few of the photos I took were then used in the gift shop of The Metropolitan Museum of Art to accompany a collection of textiles from the weavers created in conjunction with a related exhibition.

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