Hello Sunshine gets social

Candle Media's Hello Sunshine, founded by actress Reese Witherspoon, has launched an in-house social agency called Solar created to help brands connect with women through story-driven advertising. The new agency continues Hello Sunshine’s history of partnering with advertisers to build female and diverse-focused commercial messaging. In addition to enabling brands to bring underrepresented voices to media offerings, Solar will serve as Hello Sunshine’s internal marketing engine. 

“Solar presents a more formal offering that operationalizes Hello Sunshine’s trust, influence, and deep expertise with female consumers,” Hello Sunshine CEO Sarah Harden said in a statement. Solar will be overseen by Maureen Polo, Hello Sunshine’s head of direct to consumer, and Jennifer Wiener will be senior VP, working with Teneille Craig, VP of creative. 

Havas launches Play network

Havas has unveiled Havas Play, a global network that consolidates Havas’ expertise in music, sports, gaming and other fandom areas. The network unites Havas' existing services in these areas under one brand to scale across the holding company's major markets. 

Havas Play will provide strategy, ideation, creative, production and project management including partnerships, influencer marketing, experiential and live events, sponsorships, social media activation and amplification and branded entertainment. With the launch, the holding company will retire its Havas Sports & Entertainment brands unit.

“Clients of Havas Play will have unparalleled access to create meaningful experiences in collaboration with the cultural influencers that command their consumers’ attention and passion,” Yannick Bolloré, chairman and CEO of Havas, said in a statement.

The network’s first client is Harman International, which appointed Havas as global agency of record across media and creative in late 2022. The launch of Havas Play expands the relationship to include global gaming agency of record. 

Elsewhere at Havas ... 

Creative agency Havas London has named James Fox CEO. Fox fills the role after Xavier Rees was named to UK Group CEO of Havas Creative in 2022. Fox will continue to report to Rees.

Fox was most recently chief client officer. While in that role, he successfully defended The Open University account following a pitch and was integral to new business wins including the Department for the Economy’s Further Education business and substantial growth of major accounts including Molson Coors and Asda, according to a statement by Havas. He joined Havas after seven years at Omnicom agency Lucky Generals, where in 2017 he was appointed its first managing director. 

“In Fox, we’ve found a true modern leader: competitive yet compassionate, and someone who instinctively gets what it takes to build a thriving culture within a progressive, 21st-century agency,” said Rees.

The company hasn’t made plans yet to fill Fox’s previous role, according to a spokesman for Havas.

Gun misuse

The Ad Council and Brady, an organization dedicated to educating people about gun violence, have launched a new campaign that depicts the many examples of firearm “misuse.” The pro-bono “Prepare for Misuse” PSA from McKinney focuses on the danger of unsecured guns by highlighting examples of unintentional shootings, firearm suicide and intentional shootings.

All the examples shown can be prevented through safe gun storage, the campaign suggests.

“For the first time, we have expanded our effort to show the impact of unsecured firearms being misused both inside and now outside of the home, like in a school,” Brady President Kris Brown said in a statement. “Our aim with this initiative is to motivate gun owners across the country to prevent the tragedy of family fire, and we hope these new PSAs inspire people to take action within their homes to protect their loved ones.”

Giant Spoon names first chief strategy officer

Giant Spoon has appointed Amaris Singer as its first chief strategy officer. Singer will lead the agency’s strategy unit, which works across creative, media and strategy teams for clients. 

“Strategy is the foundation of brand transformation because it creates focus and clarity for every choice we make,” Singer said in a statement. "Bringing strategic intention to every creative touchpoint builds more memorable brands that drive growth for our partners.”

Singer joined Giant Spoon from Mother, where she led strategy for the agency and its branding and design arm Mother Design. She has worked in business and creative roles at Disney, Wolff Olins, Fahrenheit and McKinsey.

In other executive moves, Giant Spoon promoted Janina Volpe to VP, group strategy director and Erin Vogler to group strategy director.

Just briefly

Out-of-home media agency Talon has acquired Novus Media Canada. The acquisition expands Talon’s North America footprint and puts it in position to capitalize on the 12% growth OOH is poised to see in Canada in 2023, according to the company. This acquisition has no effect on Novus’ U.S. presence.

WPP has acquired influencer marketing agency Goat, which specializes in data-driven, end-to-end influencer campaigns. Goat will join GroupM and merge with its influencer marketing solution Inca. 

Acadia has hired Rebecca Yi as its head of influencer marketing. Yi was part of building Village Marketing, acquired by WPP in 2022. She has also led integrated marketing efforts at Edelman and Ogilvy. 

WPP global creative content production company Hogarth has appointed Matthew Bristowe as its first global director of VFX. He joins from Jellyfish Pictures, where he served as managing director overseeing global operations across four studios, covering VFX, feature animation, technology and creative.

VMLY&R’s summer internships and neXus program, a series of 10 weekly virtual seminars hosted by VMLY&R global leadership, begin later this year. Applications are available through April 20.