Integrated creative agency Partners + Napier has brought on board Matt Schwartz as director, growth, Lisa Della Piana as associate creative director, Janine Perry as director, strategy, and Rachel Meyer as director of media.
Rochester native Schwartz will lead all business development efforts at Partners + Napier, including strategic prospecting and pitching within the agency’s key verticals, which include health & wellness, food & beverage and technology. He is also tasked with building and strengthening industry partnerships, and will oversee the agency’s PR, social, content development and internal communications.
Schwartz moved back to his hometown at the onset of the pandemic in 2020 from New York City, where he continued to work virtually in business development for Mother New York. He spent more than five years at Mother, three of which working in account management for such clients as Target, JW Marriott and Instagram.
Della Piana has relocated to Rochester from Boston, where she spent six years at MullenLowe working on such clients as Royal Caribbean, JetBlue, US Cellular and ULTA Beauty, most recently as an associate creative director. Other agency stints and client experience include Forsman & Bodensfor (American Express), mcgarrybowen (UAL, Marriott) and Digitas (Comcast). It was at MullenLowe where she first worked with Rob Kottkamp, who joined Partners + Napier in mid-2019 as chief creative officer.
In her new role, Della Piana will work across integrated pieces of business like MDLIVE and Saputo, serving as a key creative voice and champion alongside colleagues from media, strategy and production. She will also be the lead creative on new business.
Joining Partners + Napier as director, strategy is Perry, who will help lead the agency’s commitment to “audience-led” insights, specifically aimed at amplifying the briefing process in ways that drive deeper creative impact. Beyond her work with Fortune 100 brands, Perry has also developed widely adopted DE&I initiatives focused on fostering inclusive employee cultures and advancing brands’ ability to resonate with diverse audiences.
Perry will be working from Washington D.C., where she was sr. strategist, brand & multicultural at Edelman. She has also held key strategy roles at sparks & honey, DigitasLBi, and mcgarrybowen, all in New York City.
In her new role, Meyer is working closely with Jordan Murphy, VP, group media director at Partners + Napier, to continue building and enhancing the shop’s media discipline, which was fully integrated into the agency in 2018. With a keen grasp of the digital media environment, Meyer creates and evaluates media strategies based on an audience-led approach to drive and reach clients’ business goals.
Meyer moved across the country from San Francisco, where she had been working as an associate media director at dentsu mcgarrybowen on accounts including Dr. Scholl’s, Pacific Gas & Electric and Microsoft. Prior to that, she worked at UM Worldwide in New York City on such accounts as The Hershey Company and BMW.
Regarding the infusion of new talent, Partners + Napier CEO Courtney Cotrupe said, “Since 2020, the agency has added new and incremental business from the likes of Smashburger, MDLIVE, Real Good Fish, and Rip Van, while opening Gammut Productions as our own in-house content production studio–even while working primarily remotely. This has spurred our recent flurry of new hires, with Rochester’s reputation as a great place to live helping to attract impressive talent from major cities, each of whom was looking to improve their quality of life and land at an ambitious, brand-building agency determined to leave a mark on culture.”
