Gaëtan Namouric, Executive Vice-President, Chief Creative Officer, Bleublancrouge, Montreal

Naming every award Gaëtan has won over his career would take all day, so let’s just say it’s a lot. He’s been recognized more than 100 times in all—at Cannes, the Créas, the One Show, the New York Festival, in Communication Arts, and more—including a “Best In Show” at the IMMA Awards for his work on The Gazette.

Gaëtan hasn’t always been a creative. Before landing in Montreal a decade ago, he spent 5 years as a media planner and online strategist. He came early to cyberspace and has been wild about the Web ever since. Community sites? They’re his specialty. The latest innovations? He knows them by heart. Creating buzz? Been there, done that—since his first banner in 1997. But he hasn’t completely forsaken TV, print, or radio, far from it. He’s done stand-out work for brands as varied as BMW Mini (which he launched in Quebec), Nike, Molson, and Viagra, and he’s currently at it again for The Gazette, Toyota, and the Literacy Foundation.

As a natural leader with a keen eye for talent and passion for everything he touches, Gaëtan spurs bleublancrouge teams to create campaigns that make the agency and its clients proud. His motto? “Say no to the status quo and little ideas.” He loves sussing out The Big Idea, giving his clients creative communications that’ll get their messages across for years in all kinds of media, from POS to iPhone apps.

As one of the industry’s foremost creative directors, it’s no surprise that Gaëtan’s talent earns him regular invitations to serve as a jury member at nearly every creative competition around. This top CD is remaking the way advertising is done, and ensures bleublancrouge offers its clients more, every day.
 

Jenny Smith, Creative Group Head, Target Marketing and Communications, St. John’s, Newfoundland and Labrador

Unlike most ad veterans across Canada, Jenny lives and works nowhere near Toronto. Or Montreal. Or Vancouver (although she does enjoy shopping in these places). Instead, you’ll find her on the eastern edge of North America in St. John’s.

With 16 years in the ad business, her work has been recognized at Cannes, London International Awards, CLIOs, Marketing, Crystals, ADCCs, ICE, Extras, CMAs, CASSIES and has been featured in Applied Arts and Archive. Jenny has judged at Cannes, Young Lions, Marketing, Crystals, and the Adrian Awards. In her spare time, she likes to hang out in the garden with her children, James and Mary.

Aaron Starkman, Partner and Creative Director, Rethink, Toronto

Aaron Starkman has garnered more Gold awards at the Cannes Advertising festival than any other ad professional in Canada.

He is currently Partner and Creative director at Rethink in Toronto. Prior to joining Rethink in 2012, Aaron made his mark at Zig(now Crispin Porter + Bogusky) writing for, and later heading up the agency's creative department as its Executive Creative Director.

Since his arrival there in 2002, he helped the agency rank in the top five in Canada for nine straight years – one of only two agencies to maintain such success. Along the way, Aaron has received a great deal of personal recognition such being named as Marketing Magazine's creative person under 30 to watch in 2005. He’s also won at every major award show in the world, including D&AD, the Clios, One Show and Cannes –where his prison Visitor ad for Vim won a gold lion in 2004 and came one vote away from winning the grand prix. Further success in Cannes occurred in 2007 when Aaron added a gold and silver media lion. The result being that Zig, the “advertising agency”, ranked as the 3rd best “media agency” in the world -despite not having a single media employee. Another gold lion in 2008 made Aaron the first advertising writer in the world to have won gold lions in film, radio and media.

Other than industry accolades, Aaron’s work has received attention from the mainstream press and even the odd celebrity like Ellen Degeneres, who declared one of his tv spots as her 'favorite of all time' on her program.

Aaron is a frequent contributor to industry forums, and has been the keynote speaker at industry events 3 blocks away from Rethink and as far away as Seoul, Korea. He’s been selected to judge national and international Award shows including the One Show and Cannes-where he served as Canada's youngest ever film/television juror.