2023 Jury

Ari Elkouby
CCO
Wunderman Thompson

Ari Elkouby is Chief Creative Officer at Wunderman Thompson Canada where he creatively oversees a diverse portfolio of clients here in Canada and the United States.

He has worked on both sides of the border including stops at Fallon Worldwide, FCB, BBDO Proximity and Zulu Alpha Kilo. His multi-channel background has made him an asset for an array of clients looking for media agnostic campaigns and large-scale platform thinking.

Ari also brings with him an invaluable background in design and has been instrumental in helping lead Wunderman Thompson’s Identity and design practice which has helped birth half a dozen new brands and reimagined half a dozen more.

During his 7-year tenure at Wunderman Thompson, the agency has been named runner up as Strategy’s Agency of the Year twice and his work has been recognized internationally by Cannes, OneShow, The Clios, The Webby Awards, Communication Arts and has graced the pages of Wired, Fast Company and the New York Times.

Ari is fiercely collaborative and regularly contributes thought leadership pieces to various publications on industry trends as well as sits on numerous jury panels to help recognize the best work being produced across Canada and beyond.

Stacey Biggar
Director, Chocolate Marketing
Mondelez

Over the past 20 years, Stacey has built award-winning equity campaigns and driven strong business results in various marketing leadership positions.  While currently the head of marketing for Cadbury at Mondelez Canada, she’s led teams across cookies, crackers & confectionary brands in Canada and the US for Mondelēz, as well as food brands for Unilever. Stacey is a people-first leader who combines her what & her how to inspire others to think big, get off the beaten path sometimes, and always have consumers at the heart of the conversation. Some of her favourite projects have included launching belVita #morningwin in North America, bringing Canadians award-winning chocolate innovations like Cadbury Micro Mini Eggs & Salted Caramilk, and of course, helping to keep the mystery of the Caramilk secret alive.  An avid chef and lover of travel, Stacey lives north of the city with her 2 daughters and husband.

Ryan Booth
Creative Director
Thinkingbox

Ryan is an internationally recognized multi-disciplined designer. As a member, and leader, of a handful of award-winning creative teams, his work spans brand identity programs, packaging, experiential & interior design, and advertising for clients such as Harley-Davidson, Bell, Netflix, Fairmont Hotels & Resorts, Chobani, Interac and
Tim Hortons.

Ryan has taught branding at Miami Ad School Toronto, been named a top 10 designer in Strategy Magazine’s Creative Report Card, and led Zulu Alpha Kilo’s design team to DAOY gold in 2018.

Ryan’s work has been recognized by Communication Arts, The One Show, Applied Arts, Graphis, The Art Directors Club, Fast Company Design, Luerzer’s Archive, and many more.

Thane Calder
Founder
CloudRaker

An entrepreneur in the creative and digital realm who believes that his university degrees in philosophy and evolution biology were perfect preparation for his business career.

Thane founded CloudRaker in 2000 with the conviction that the Internet was going to change business forever. In just a few years, with an over-extended credit card, Thane helped build CloudRaker from zero into a bustling digital strategy and creative marketing agency doing work for clients across Canada, USA, and Europe.  

In 2017, CloudRaker made the strategic decision to join forces with Altavia Group, a global marketing services firm specialized in retail brands. This move strengthened CloudRaker's positioning as a retail expert in North America and reflects Thane's incessant push to evolve and embrace the ever changing business landscape. 

A creative business thinker by instinct, Thane leads the cultural vision of the agency. He is instrumental in fostering unconventional thinking and instilling in the team a sense of purpose, results, and values.

Lauren
Dineen-Duarte
VP Corporate Affairs & Communications
American Express

A transformational communicator with a reputation for spearheading industry and market firsts, Lauren Dineen-Duarte is the Vice President, Corporate Affairs & Communications for American Express Canada. In this role, she oversees public affairs and media relations, social media, colleague communications, reputational risk management and corporate social responsibility. Through her tenure at Amex, Lauren has played a key role in strengthening the American Express brand in Canada through a mix of strategic storytelling, thought-leadership initiatives, and high impact programming.

Leading Corporate Affairs & Communications for American Express Canada, Lauren connects the company’s PR and social narratives, while growing the brand’s digital footprint through strategic partnerships and innovative influencer relationships.  Lauren’s focus on expanding reach into new channels has been balanced by a thoughtful approach to expanding share of voice across earned media channels. Lauren’s team also leads internal communications for the business, contributing to strong employee engagement and ensuring alignment between internal and external strategies.  

Lauren is an award-winning communicator, and sought-after speaker, delivering keynotes at top industry associations including Women of Influence and the Canadian Marketing Association. She also serves on the board of The Toronto Children’s Breakfast Club. 

Lauren lives in Mississauga with her husband Romeo and her two sons, Kingsley and Theodore.

Tanbir Grover
Chief Marketing and Digital Officer
Pet Valu

Tanbir Grover is the Vice President, eCommerce & Omnichannel  for Lowe's Canada. He joined Lowe's in the summer of 2012, to lead and establish Lowes.ca as a comprehensive destination for home improvement products and inspiration. Prior to joining Lowe's, Tanbir was the Director of eCommerce at The Hudson's Bay Company where he successfully launched the site and was instrumental in its growth and success. Tanbir has also worked for Sears Canada in managing their online business and has a diverse set of experiences through his work with Coca-Cola and Bombardier. With an Honours Degree in Commerce from McMaster University and an MBA from the Rotman School of Management at the University of Toronto, Tanbir is a well-known and well respected advocate of Canada's emerging eCommerce industry.

Sarah Jordan
CEO
Mastermind

Sarah Jordan is CEO of Mastermind Toys, the nation's largest specialty toy and kids book store and Canada's Authority on Play. She leads 68 stores coast-to-coast and online, with thousands of employees from teams across their stores, Play HQ (head office) and warehouse, and creates a world-class employee and customer experience.  In 2021, Mastermind Toys won the Omni Channel Award at Retail Council of Canada's Excellence in Retailing Awards for their digital transformation and Sarah received the Innovation Award at the Women of Inspiration Awards by the Universal Womens Network. Recently, Mastermind Toys was named a 2022 winner of Canada's Best Managed Companies and won the 2022 Retail Marketing award at the Excellence in Retailing Awards. 

Sarah is a passionate, authentic, purpose-driven CEO with deep expertise in customer & employee experience, digital innovation and brand-centric reinvention. Previously she was the Senior Vice President, Customer Experience and Omni Channel Strategy at Scotiabank where she led the bank from #5 to #1 in customer experience ratings. She spent a decade with Boston Consulting Group, where she advised Fortune 500 companies on large scale retail customer centric transformations and cultural change. Sarah holds both an MBA and an Engineering degree from Queen’s University.   

She is a board member at Wawanesa Mutual Insurance Company, the largest Canadian Property and Casualty Mutual Insurer with $4.2 billion in annual revenue, and assets of $11.3 billion, and 125 year heritage. She is also a board member at the Canadian Toy Association, the first-ever retail member in the organization’s history whose members include manufacturers, importers, distributors, and retailers in the $2.5 billion toy industry in Canada. She is also a board member at the Retail Council of Canada, the voice of retail in Canada, representing 45,000 store fronts, $485 billion in sales and 2.2 million employees.

Debbie Lai
SVP Marketing, Loyalty, Strategy
Rexall

Debbie Lai is currently the Senior Vice-President of Marketing, Loyalty & Strategy at Rexall Pharmacy Group, a division of McKesson Canada. Debbie is responsible for growing Rexall’s brand awareness, proprietary loyalty program - Be Well - membership & benefits and leading all corporate development activities, including strategy development, alignment & execution.

Debbie brings a rich balance of strategic & operational leadership experience established from working at top tier retail (Shoppers Drug Mart, Loblaw), consulting (Deloitte) & healthcare (St. Paul’s Hospital, Sunnybrook Health Sciences) organizations. Debbie is known for her ability to lead diverse, cross-functional teams to deliver impactful innovation and sustainable financial results.

Debbie is a proud alumnus of the Rotman MBA and UBC Pharmacy programs.

Doug Muir
Executive Creative Director
Proof Experiences Inc.

Doug has over 18 years of experience in senior creative roles with agencies in Toronto such as One Method, FCB, Publicis, Leo Burnett, kenna, Bond Brand Loyalty and SDI Mktg. His passion for memorable, disruptive creative is undeniable, with a consumer-first approach that has produced effective and award-winning integrated work for the likes of Gap, PepsiCo, Adidas, Unilever, CIBC, TD Canada Trust, RBC Financial, PC Financial, Sony Playstation, Heineken, General Motors, and Universal Music.  He is also (along with Questlove of the Hip Hop band, The Roots) a founding member of Okayplayer.com, a New York & Philadelphia based progressive urban music artist hub and online community.

David Patton
Head, Wine Rack Marketing
Arterra Wine

David has a long history of working with some of Canada’s most beloved and trusted brands on award-winning campaigns across the Retail, CPG and Bev/Alc categories. He first earned his stripes working at Loblaw where he helped guide President’s Choice and its cherished seasonal marketing campaign, the Insider’s Report, through a massive brand evolution project that saw the biggest digital, TV, radio, print and XM investment in the organization’s history on its way to winning several accolades from the Canadian Marketing Association and Strategy Magazine among others. He was also instrumental in the development of the marketing strategy for PC’s innovation funnel, being responsible for the planning and execution of ‘big bet’ product launches. He was notably on the task force responsible for re-branding and launching both PC Optimum, Canada’s most popular loyalty program, and PC Express, Canada’s most popular online grocery service. Most recently, he has been working at Arterra, Canada’s largest wine company, evolving the brand strategies and digital maturity of brand’s like Jackson-Triggs, Canada’s favourite wine brand, and Wine Rack, Ontario’s largest private wine retailer. David believes that any good marketer should be equal parts scientist and artist and finding the right balance between data driven insight and creativity is what separates the cream of the crop.

Michelle Spivak
Group Creative Director
Rethink

Michelle’s experience as a creative has taken her from Toronto, to New York and back again, twice. Settling back home in Toronto just before we were all forced to settle in for Covid. 

In her 18 years of experience she’s worked in almost every type of agency, from traditional,  

to shopper marketing, to purely digital and content, and now settling in at Rethink - her favourite type of place: an agency with a mix of everything where she can use her varied experience to truly approach work in a holistic, platform-agnostic manner. 

Over the years, she’s found joy and opportunity working on almost every category of brand, from tampons to cars, spirits to fashion, home goods to haemorrhoid cream. In between, she’s found joy in working on her two little humans as well. 

Her work has been featured in all the industry publications, the New York Times, and across industry award shows. But what excites her most is creating work that regular humans love and talk about.

Lorne Cooperberg
SVP, Growth & Innovation
Proof Experiences

With over 18 years in the marketing world (read: the grey hairs are showing), Lorne started his career in creative agencies, working on big multimedia campaigns with some of North America’s more recognizable brands. It was there, though, that Lorne got his first taste of activations, building out a sponsorship property and bringing it to life with its sponsors. Lorne discovered his passion in the industry and ten years ago chose to pursue the sponsorship and activation side of the business full time.

That breadth of experience is the foundation for Lorne’s deep understanding of the consumer’s path to purchase. Now, as SVP of Growth & Innovation and a trusted partner to many clients, Lorne leverages that understanding to build activations that influence consumer behaviour for brands like Interac, Mercedes-Benz, RBC, and The Home Depot.

Zuheir Kotob
ACD
Cossette

Zuheir is currently an Associate Creative Director at Cossette. As a creative he has a deep appreciation for strategy and his work regularly draws inspiration from pop culture, entertainment and silly banter with his copywriter partner, Jason Soy.

Zuheir has worked on global brands such as McDonald’s, Walmart, Mazda, BMW, HSBC, The Home Depot, Air Canada and Tim Horton’s. His work has been recognized at Canadian and international award shows but never at the New York Festivals which sucks but whatever.

Outside of work, Zuheir enjoys soccer, basketball and a good game of Catan.

John Rocco
VP and Head of Global Brand Management
Scotiabank

Mine has been a journey of learning: I’ve had the good fortune to work through some of the most transformative eras of marketing. Through leadership roles at Scotiabank, Target, Loblaws, Indigo, and others, my career has been shaped by driving inspiring teams toward massive brand transformations. I’ve seen amazing things happen when we combine data science and technology with the art of marketing and storytelling. 

The craft of storytelling and building emotional connections with customers is what gets me on the train every morning. 

When not “branding,” I spend every moment with my brilliant wife, our two sons and our non-hunting hunting dogs. I am a tortured non-published author who will one day finish that book. I am also a lifetime student currently embarking on a journey to a PhD in Marketing,  mainly so my friends have to call me Dr. J.

Maureen Romansky
VP Marketing Premium Chocolate Canada
Ferrero

Maureen has been entrenched in the Canadian marketing world for the past 20 years, working on leading global brands across multiple categories. Currently the senior marketing director for overall premium chocolate at Ferrero Canada, Maureen also leads premium bars and assortments across Ferrero North America.

Maureen started her career as an intern at the former Palmer-Jarvis DDB in Toronto, before switching sides and working client-side at Kraft Canada and then Ferrero. Her experience on both sides of the business provides a rich and holistic perspective when building comprehensive marketing campaigns.Over the past 15 years at Ferrero, Maureen has launched important innovations like Ferrero Collection, Nutella&Go!, Golden Galley Signature and Ferrero Rocher chocolate bars; she has spearheaded innovative, award-winning integrated campaigns building equity for brands including Nutella, Kinder, and Ferrero Rocher. Many of her innovation launches and consumer activations have garnered industry recognition and consumer praise. Working on a brand that is renowned for its shopper marketing and instore executions, Maureen brings a wealth of hands-on experience to this year’s jury.

Maureen is the proud mom of two teenagers. Her favourite places to be outside the office include the gym, the beach, or the sofa (with a good book and a glass of wine).

Stacey Salmon
Vice President, Canada Marketing
Jamieson Laboratories

Stacey Salmon is currently the Vice President of Canada Marketing at Jamieson Wellness inc. (JWEL), responsible for the strategic vision of the six brands within the Canadian portfolio. With over 16 years of marketing experience, Stacey has been dedicated to building strong strategic plans, smart consumer-first product development, and impactful creative messaging to reach various target markets.

With a passion for health and wellness, Stacey has focused her work on brands within the supplement industry. She started her marketing career as a copywriter for brands such as Muscle Tech, leaning on her engaging storytelling abilities, and continually progressed to now building 360 marketing plans for brands such as Jamieson, the #1 vitamin, minerals, and supplement (VMS) brand in Canada.

Stacey is a proud mother of one and a proud alumnus of Mississippi State University where she competed as a division one SEC track and field athlete, receiving her BBA (with a major in marketing) and MBA.

Garett Senez
Partner
Quark Baby

Garett Senez is an award-winning marketer, with 15 years of sales and marketing experience for leading consumer brands. A dynamic leader, he brings a competitive edge and outstanding brand communications expertise to global companies looking to scale.

In his last leadership roles in Consumer Packaged Goods (L’Oreal, SABMiller), and Healthcare (LUFF Brands, Emerald Health Therapeutics), Garett has consistently proven his capability to lead diverse teams of practitioners worldwide to a common goal. A strategic thinker, Garett thrives in competitive work environments and has a passion for storytelling.

Garett is an avid entrepreneur, founding PACRIM Distributors in 2015, a Global Affairs Canada and Canadian Trade Commission partner organization. PACRIM Distributors supports the long run growth of the Canadian craft brewery industry by distributing 13 Canadian craft beer brands in 21 international markets including the premium showcase markets of Singapore, Hong Kong, Taiwan, Thailand, and Indonesia.

More recently, Garett founded Quark, a Canadian company creating the future of ‘parent products’. Developed with parents in mind, Quark products are designed to be durable and long-lasting, accessible, less wasteful, and uncompromising in safety. Quark has established a record Canadian business and is now listed at every major Canadian retailer in the country, including Walmart, Real Canadian Superstore, London Drugs, Indigo, Amazon, and more. The company is currently completing Series-A financing in advance of entering the United States market with Target USA in March 2023.

Garett is a member of the Canadian Marketing Association, has a Bachelor’s of Business Administration in Marketing from Simon Fraser University and a Global MBA from the University of Victoria.

Laura Serra
ECD
Mosaic

Laura is like a Trivial Pursuit scoring token of an ECD, having collected all the creative wedges on the marketing board game. She’s been a creative leader across a wide range of disciplines from traditional advertising, digital, and design to public relations, experiential marketing, and integrated commerce (yes that’s six, six pies for those counting). Much like the game, her Twist is that she’s exploring the bonus track of her career and started to collect wedges on the production side of the game, overseeing all content production in her current role and even earning the golden pie of commercial directing. Her favourite category? Orange pie, Sports and Leisure, of course. Her life motto? Roll the dice.

Mike Winter
President
Chalkboard Marketing

Mike Winter is an established career Marketer with over 20 years experience on both brand side and agency side marketing. In 2007, he founded Chalkboard Marketing.  While most activation agencies at the time pitched their execution capabilities, Mike looked to build an activation agency that lead with strategy and creative. Dissecting a brand to understand its essence and creating a story that could come to life in a meaningful way. 15 years later, Chalkboard has worked with some of the biggest brands in Canada, including Bell, Nike, Uber Eats, Corby (including Absolut, Wiser’s, Jameson, and Havana Club), Campbell’s Canada, Facebook, Gay Lea Foods and more.