Publicis-owned LePub has hired Shannon Nunn to run its New York office as CEO. Nunn spent his previous tour as president of Special NY, an indie shop outpost, before signing on to run a stateside hub that opened its doors in 2024 on the back of two founding accounts: Heineken and Barilla.
Nunn explained the jump by citing the “ambition to build something different.” Specifically, he praised LePub as “an agency that puts creativity and culture at the center, with the data, technology, and scale of Publicis behind it.”
The bespoke boutique play is agency holding company tradition at its purest. When global legacy brands start getting restless about buying mid-century TV scripts from a sprawling network, you carve out a stylish satellite, give it an Italian-by-way-of-Paris moniker, and hire indie leadership to give the credits credibility. The client gets the thrill of sitting in a downtown creative bullpen. The holding company keeps the media fees, the master services agreement, and the consolidated margins safely inside the family.
The trade-off lives entirely in the org chart. Nunn will report to Susie Nam, CEO of Publicis Creative U.S., while simultaneously answering to Bruno Bertelli, global CEO and chief creative officer of LePub Worldwide. That is two corporate reporting lines, across two continents, overseeing one office built to service exactly two founding anchor clients.
Building something different usually requires an empty slate. Nunn gets two clients, two bosses, and the full weight of Publicis making sure neither beer nor pasta leaves the building.