Zulu Alpha Kilo has promoted Stephanie Yung to chief design officer and Brian Murray to chief creative officer, reporting into agency founder and current CCO Zak Mroueh.
Yung joined Zulu in 2020, returning from a 10-year stay in New York at design and innovation firm, Smart Design. During her time at Zulu, Yung has grown the design team and expanded the talent offering to push design thinking beyond traditional branding and graphic design and deeper into how brands behave across experiences, products, and services. Yung was instrumental in championing the Micropedia for Microaggressions initiative that Zulu created on behalf of a coalition of DEI groups. The online tool has been adopted by corporations, government bodies, and organizations around the world. It was recognized with a Fusion Pencil at the One Show, two Cannes Lions, a D&AD pencil, and Design Best of Show at the local Marketing awards. Yung and Mroueh have a long history, having worked together at TAXI and in the early days of Zulu.
Murray, who has an MBA from the Rotman School of Management, joined Zulu two years ago on the heels of the tremendously successful “Courage is Beautiful” campaign for Dove, which landed him two Grand Prix at Cannes. Murray was ranked the top creative director in Canada on both the 2021 and 2022 One Show rankings. Since joining Zulu, Murray made an immediate impact on both existing client work and attracting new business. For Pizza Pizza, a new client to the agency, Murray led the Fixed-Rate Pizza campaign that has already sold more than 500,000 pizzas and garnered global media coverage in the Wall Street Journal and New York Times. He also led creative for The Canadian Legion’s Orders of Sacrifice campaign, winning a D&AD Pencil in addition to many other global accolades.
“Steph and Brian have earned their stripes at Zulu. I’m thrilled to support them as they step into their new roles. They’re exceptional creative leaders and have earned the respect and trust of our clients and our team. I know they’ll continue to create and lead boundary pushing work that our client partners expect of Zulu,” said Mroueh.
Mroueh’s original vision for the structure included a third promotion for ECD Wain Choi to become chief creative officer alongside Yung and Murray. However, Choi, who joined Zulu just prior to the pandemic after a 13-year stint in Korea, has decided to leave the agency world after over 30 years as a successful global creative working in markets such as Europe, Korea, and Canada. He will leave the agency at the end of March and he hopes to spend more time with his family and will be working with a client in Korea that he will service out of Canada.
“Wain has been an incredible creative partner over the past three years,” said Mroueh. “His track record for doing smart, innovative work with craft excellence has been impressive and we’re going to miss him.” Choi has led many great campaigns at the agency including Subaru’s Welcome to Uncommon brand platform plus multiple award-winning campaigns for Bell, Interac, and Harry Rosen.
With Choi moving on, Mroueh has started the search for another creative leader to join forces with Murray and Yung.
Mroueh himself will be moving into the creative chairman role with a mandate to raise the creative bar across all of Zulu’s offices. “We’re blessed with an abundance of talent in New York, Vancouver, and Toronto. My focus in the year ahead will be to mentor and support all our creative leaders and inspire creative bravery across the entire Zulu family.”
