Sophie Young has been appointed managing director of the 25-year-old agency Showpony Adelaide, marking a significant shift for the South Australian creative industry.
She is the only female leader of a large creative agency in Adelaide.
“We have such a talented team here in Adelaide with exceptional chemistry. I feel privileged to be taking the reigns of such a famously creative agency,” saysYoung.\
“With our strong recruiting last year, I’m excited by what we will do for our clients in 2021.”
Founders Jamie Scott and Parris Mesidis are happy to see the agency under the leadership of Young and creative director Rory Kennet-Lister.
“Our agency has grown by about 50% n the last year and Sophie’s leadership as General Manager was fundamental to that expansion,” says Scott. “We’re so fortunate to have someone of Sophie’s calibre and experience leading our team.”
Scott and Mesidis will maintain a strong connection to the agency overall but will turn their attention to client strategy and the agency’s growing Melbourne office.
“Adelaide is in safe hands with Soph and Rory,” says group creative director, Parris Mesidis. “We’re looking forward to seeing the amazing client work that this energetic young team can produce.”
Young has been an integral part of Showpony’s history in Adelaide, joining as an account manager in 2006. Despite a three-year absence to take up a management role in New York, she returned in 2014 as account director and partner, then general manager.
“I first started at the agency back in 2006,” says Young. “After leaving to accept an opportunity in New York, I returned to Showpony because I missed being involved with the world-class creative campaigns that this agency produces.
“Throughout my career, the work that I’m most proud of includes the campaigns that seek to influence social change. It’s those campaigns that demonstrate how the creative industry makes a positive contribution to society. I look forward to continuing the creative and cultural legacy of Showpony.”
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