Stagwell merged Doner and Colle McVoy under the DonerColle Partners banner in January 2026 — the two agencies kept their own teams and clients while pooling leadership and talent. On May 28, 2026, the company took the step that would actually test that merger: naming Mariana O’Kelly its first joint Chief Creative Officer, starting June 1. O’Kelly was EVP/executive creative director at Leo Burnett Chicago, running Kellogg’s brands including Special K, Frosted Flakes, Froot Loops, Frosted Mini-Wheats, Raisin Bran and Kashi; over roughly 30 years she has worked on KFC, Philips, Kellogg’s, Campbell’s, SC Johnson and Kimberly-Clark (Huggies, Pledge). At DonerColle Partners she’ll oversee creative for a portfolio that includes The Coca-Cola Company, DQ, Hershey, Jeep, Ram, La-Z-Boy, Perdue, McCormick & Company, Revlon and The UPS Store.
CEO Jessica Henrichs’ rationale for the hire gives away what the real test of a two-agency merger is — not the balance sheet, but building one creative voice: “Now is the absolute right time to bring in a creative leader who can really set that creative vision and that shared ambition to bring the best out of both agencies.” The appointment landed right after the company’s first major joint client win, Hershey’s salty-snacks portfolio — a sequence that isn’t incidental: the merger won the business first, then clarified the voice.
The real signal here is the choice to name one person as the unifying voice rather than co-leads or a committee. In a merger, ambiguity about whose taste wins is the fastest way to lose the client relationships that justified the merger in the first place.