"In less than a year the African offices of Quirk have more than doubled in size, with Johannesburg now a fully autonomous agency. Quirk has entered a period of unbridled expansion and growth, and with the boom in the digital industry in general, some strategic executive changes were in order," explains Stokes.
Additional executive changes within Quirk include the appointment of Nic Ray to a role as Chairman of the Quirk Agency Group. One of Quirk's finest leaders, Nic Ray is an industry stalwart who cut his teeth at Ogilvy in CT, before moving to Ogilvy London where he ran the Ford business for Europe. He has for the last three years been MD of Quirk London and has been instrumental in turning a small satellite office, overly-dependent on the local agencies, into an agency in its own right, battling it out against the best in the world. Chairmanship will see Ray take a greater lead at a group level, directing Quirk's international business. Top financial brain, Andrew Allison has been brought in as CFO of the group.
31 year old Rob Stokes, who founded Quirk in 1999 while still a student, and built a leading digital agency from the ground up, moves into the role of CEO of the Group Holding Company, which includes oversight of the Quirk agencies in Cape Town, Johannesburg and London, as well as several other Quirk businesses, most notably BrandsEye and IdeaBounty.
Stokes says he will be spending an increasing amount of time working on strategy and key client engagements alongside Group Holding Company Chair Mark Sherrington. And with the growing interest in Quirk's London business, it is expected that Stokes will be spending more time abroad focusing on the Group's international expansion. Stokes is also committed to building out the Education and consulting arms of the Group.
As the new CEO of the Quirk Agency Group, Justin Spratt will have two regional Managing Directors reporting to him, as well as the Chief Creative Officer, Clint Bryce.
Formerly Spratt ran the VoIP Mobile and Wi-Fi business at Internet Solutions and prior to that he worked for investment bank Morgan Stanley on the Credit Derivatives trading desk.
"It is a tremendous privilege for Rob and the board to entrust me with this key role. Our goals for the upcoming year are big and we believe we are very well placed to deliver outstanding work for clients, current and new," says Spratt.
Stokes agrees, saying, " Quirk has reached a point of maturity over the last few years and I have immense faith in Spratt to lead the team to even greater heights."
About Quirk: Founded in 1999, Quirk provides digital marketing services to a global client base. The agency's success is derived from strong creative concepts delivered through technical excellence. With offices in Cape Town, Johannesburg and London, Quirk offers a complete range of digital services from strategy and creative production through to analytics and social media. The Quirk team is made up of 100-plus digital natives who deliver results through fresh insights driven by empirical data analysis. Quirk counts Capitec Bank, DStv, Werksmans, Sun International, Avusa and Distell among its clients.Visit http://www.quirk.biz to find out more.
About Justin SprattSpratt is degreed in economics and finance, and holds an MBA from Gordon Institute of Business Science (GIBS). He co-founded startup incubator ISLabs (
labs.is.co.za) and not-for-profit GeekRetreat (
geekretreat.org.za) aimed at giving back to the community through technology. Spratt also sits on the WAPA (Wireless Access Providers Association) board and the Silicon Cape (
www.siliconcape.com) board, of which Stokes is current chairman.
