Emma Thumann
Jan 25, 2025

Creative agency Ralph creates global chief growth officer role

VML's Gareth Jones steps in to lead global growth at Ralph, partnering with CEO Chris Hassell to reenergise the agency's key offices in Los Angeles, New York, London, and Tokyo.

Creative agency Ralph creates global chief growth officer role

Ralph, a creative agency with an emphasis on entertainment, hired Gareth Jones for its newly-created role of global chief growth officer earlier this month. 

Jones, who recently served as SVP, global marketing director at VML and WundermanThompson, will also be Ralph’s acting managing director of its New York office.

“Gareth and I have known each other for many years,” said Chris Hassell, Ralph’s CEO and founder. “We’ve always shared the same values of wanting to put creativity first.”

As the five-year anniversary of the Covid pandemic approaches, Hassell and Jones have observed that both the type of content and agency landscape have changed over this timeframe. For example, when it comes to changes in the type of content users consume, the lockdown led to the rise of now-popular social media platforms such as TikTok.

“Covid turned the lights off to the rest of the world,” Jones said. “That desire for rich, narrative-led high quality content kind of strayed away.”

Jones and Hassell told Campaign US that the rise of short-form content is like a whirlpool that’s “hard to get out of,” especially due to users being stuck in the "dopamine loop.”

“We’ve gone so far down that whirlpool, people don’t realise there’s other kinds of content,” Jones said. 

But now that longer-form content on platforms such as YouTube are back on the rise again, Jones said he noticed that “people generally want to move away from that notion of addiction.”

“There needs to be a broader spectrum of content that connects on an emotional level,” he added. “Social content should be about attention, not addiction.”

In terms of changes in the agency landscape, Jones said that he hopes to bring back humanity and emotion into Ralph’s content.

“In the agency world, we’ve forgotten the importance of human instinct and impact,” he said. “There’s a huge opportunity to tap back into that and make it fun again.”

Hassell echoed Jones’ statement and stated he aims to connect with people more emotionally with Ralph.

“Is the best way to just target people by their demographics?” he said. “There’s also emotions that connect people. What connects people on an emotional level?”

Ralph’s past collaborations with brands include an interactive brand activation for the show Mrs. Davis—a fictional exploration of the tension between religion and technology—in which the agency had a group of nuns take over SXSW 2023. Ralph also directed, filmed and edited a custom shoot promoting the Squid Game Experience in October of last year.

Source:
Campaign US

Related Articles

Just Published

7 hours ago

As US slams door, can the rest of the world offer ...

Or is this just another dead end? The party seems to be over, writes Ian Whittaker, as Chinese ecommerce giants scramble amid the US crackdown.

7 hours ago

ROI index charts rise of Moloco and Reddit ...

Whilst smaller ad networks reshape the mobile ad landscape with high returns, X’s reliance on gambling and adult content points to a more polarising path forward.

8 hours ago

Telstra unveils cinematic silent films—as a ...

Weird and whimsical, and a welcome break from the usual ‘put your phone away’ lecture, even if Ad Nut is not entirely sure what’s happening in this campaign.

9 hours ago

Spikes Asia Debrief set to unpack the new creative ...

This afternoon, Spikes Asia jury members will dig into key themes emerging from this year's shortlists. Register to join the event.