WorkInProgress (WIP) has hired creative director duo Kelly McCormick and D’Arcy O’Neill to head up the agency’s Domino’s partnership, after the account moved to the independent shop in January. McCormick and O’Neill also assume key leadership roles at the Boulder-based shop.
McCormick began her career at McCann Erickson, N.Y. in 2007. After a very brief stint as a junior art director, she switched to copywriting, and helped win the agency’s first Cyber Lion for Golden Grahams cereal. From 2010 on, she worked at CPB Boulder, creating breakthrough work for American Express, Burger King, Best Buy, Infiniti, Kraft Mac & Cheese, and Domino’s, with highlights including the launch of Small Business Saturday for Amex, creating the ultimate “Dream Road” that Infiniti fans could drive on in fully immersive VR, and getting Amy Poehler to make dongle jokes on TV for Best Buy during the Super Bowl.
Much of McCormick’s favorite work was made when she and O’Neill became partners “in a rare arranged work marriage that actually worked out” to run the Domino’s account at CPB. Together, McCormick and O’Neill crafted the iconic Ferris Bueller Tracker shot-for-shot remake, launched the first ever pizza wedding registry, and rolled up their sleeves and hit the pavement—literally—to pave potholes in all 50 states. Their work impacted every consumer touchpoint, from evolving Domino’s rewards program by giving people loyalty points for eating pizza even if it wasn’t Domino’s, to creating pizza damage insurance, to allowing people to get pizza delivered to places without a physical address.
O’Neill also began his career in New York by landing a job at Mother. This was followed by a brief stint at Euro RSCG, another at Modernista! in Boston, and a residency at The Martin Agency in Richmond, Va. “I worked with people I learned a lot from and got to touch many brands in nearly every category,” he noted. Eventually, D’Arcy landed at CPB in Boulder, before joining WIP. Standout campaigns include the “Official Sponsor of Birthdays” for American Cancer Society, “The Vodka” for Stolichnaya, and “The World’s Largest Blind Taste Test” for Kraft Mac & Cheese.
McCormick and O’Neill are excited to continue their partnership together and with Domino’s–at WIP where they will collaborate with talent that has worked on the brand’s biggest actions and successes both past and present spanning over a decade, a reference to the founding team at WIP who led the Domino’s ensemble while at CPB prior to founding the agency in 2016. O’Neill praised WIP’s indie spirit and vision of creating long-term partnerships, not just ads, and the special, trust-based relationship that exists with the Domino’s team.
“I had the privilege of working with Kelly and D’Arcy while at CPB years ago,” said WIP CCO Matt Talbot. “I’ve followed their successes from not very afar and am so excited to see the work that comes from our shared vision of creating bold, action-based work that generates true business results.”
