Resumé + Contact
Laura Holmes McCarthy
Strategically-minded Group Creative Director with a generative, experimental, and empathetic creative philosophy | Copywriter by trade, with an expanded focus on brand architecture, brand voice and guidance, and holistic full-funnel advertising approaches | Emerging Ceramic Artist with an active practice in downstate NY
2025-Present
SVP, Group Creative Director, Brand, Monks
Leading creative capabilities for the Monks brand capability team. Overseeing a 30 person, globally-distributed creative team across our portfolio of brand and performance clients, including Adidas, Bosch, Capital One, Disney, J.P Morgan, Uber, T Mobile, Visa and more. Partnering with our Head of Studio to structure and grow our creative remit and client roster to support our agency’s mulitdimensional brandbuilding value proposition.
2020-Present
Group Creative Director, Monks (Brand Capability), New York
(formerly Decoded Advertising)
Providing creative and strategic leadership across both consumer and B2B full funnel branding and advertising efforts including J.P. Morgan Payments, Google, Cider, CareerBuilder, Visa, Capital One, RedDrop, Wellcome Leap, El Camino Travel, Intuit QuickBooks, and others. Specializing in culturally-driven, strategically-rigorous full-funnel branding and advertising; and adapting lower-funnel, data-driven learning approaches to large-budget upper-funnel campaigns to maximize value and create sustainable campaigns that match equity building with platform efficacy. Overseeing the growth of Capital One from $1.5 million to $4 million+ within two years, expanding our creative remit from display and DCO for Small Business, to programmatic, paid and organic social, large-scale OOH campaigns, brand campaigns, and strategic positioning across both Small Business and Technology verticals. Overseeing and winning the pitch for the agency’s first fashion account, as well as the concepting and creating of the subsequent brand campaign which drove an increase above benchmark for both brand affinity and conversion metrics. Leading a cross-disciplinary effort to merchandise our agency’s new content offering, using my practical creative expertise to drive a marketable vision for profitable, scalable content projects for our clients.
S4 Women’s Executive Leadership Program UC Berkeley, 2024
Speaker DMXECO 2019: How Brands Can Drive Awareness, Action, and Affirmation
Publication Campaign US "Where are all the innovative women? At DMEXCO."
Interview Campaign US "Meet the badass women at Decoded leading Visa's creative"
Interview Glossy.co “Cider launches its first Gen Z-focused out-of-home campaign”
Interview Ad Age “How CareerBuilder is Tapping Into the 'Great Resignation'”
Award Winner, 2018 Shorty Social Good Awards, Best in Financial Services
Award Gold, 2018 Midas Awards, Illustration
Award Silver, 2018 Midas Awards, Social Media
Finalist 2018 Shorty Social Good Awards, Gender Equality category
Honoree 2019 Webby Awards, Advertising Products & Services category
Finalist 2019 Shorty Awards, Consumer Goods and Financial Services categories
Finalist 2019 Marketers That Matter, Larger Company Building Brand B2C category
2018-2020
Creative Director, Decoded Advertising, New York
Providing creative leadership on Visa, Barkbox, and Keurig. Overseeing the launch of Visa's award-winning integrated "Money is Changing" campaign, inclusive of events, film, paid and organic social, and media and influencer partnerships. Advising and implementing Decoded's "Test and Learn" process across creative initiatives to guide rapid optimizations and improve performance, campaign, and brand metrics. Providing direction for Visa US and global initiatives, including the Tokyo Olympics, the 2019 Women's World Cup, and television and social campaigns for their Contactless technology initiatives.
2017-2018
Independent Brand Consultant, Writer, and Creative Director
Providing creative and strategic direction, writing, and brand consulting for advertising agencies, strategic consultancies, startups, and clients. Offering services for brand strategy and positioning, branding guideline creation, brand audits, new business pitch work, advertising concepting and messaging, product copywriting, and content creation. Clients include Downtown Music, Songtrust, Decoded Advertising, cg42 (OWKIN, PwC, TIAA, MetLife, Miles4Migrants), EP+Co, Tribal DDB, and CAST LA.
2017
Brand Creative Director, Kickstarter, New York
Overseeing and executing creative work and content strategy for brand level initiatives spanning product, copy, content, and events. Crafting new voice and tone guidelines for the company's first major rebranding initiative. Collaborating with product designers and engineers to restructure our project build UX for greater creator success. Working with our Content team to use creative work to drive creator acquisition. Creating and implementing a process for content capture and branding at major external events including the Sundance Film Festival, CES, and PAX, as well as Kickstarter's own unconference, PWL, in conjunction with our Communities team.
2016-2017
Director of Copy, D'Addario, New York
Overseeing and executing creative branding, advertising, marketing, and product development (including naming, design direction, and brand positioning) across all five verticals within D'Addario brands including Fretted, Percussion, Orchestral, Woodwinds, and Accessories. Crafting and guiding brand-level activations for consumer-, retail-, and sales-facing communications, events, and trade shows. Contributing copy and UX guidance for a major b2b digital transformation. Working with company leadership to shape and grow the company's in-house branding and marketing team from its early stages. Collaborating across disciplines including content, media, artist relations, product development and strategy to solidify process and influence the direction of the company's major brand initiatives.
2014-2015
Creative, BBH, New York
Overseeing and executing creative duties on Great Nations Eat, Seamless, Vaseline, and Newell Rubbermaid.
2013-2014
Associate Creative Director, Saatchi & Saatchi, New York
Overseeing and executing creative duties on Tide, Goodwill, and Yoplait.
2011-2013
Senior Copywriter, Saatchi & Saatchi, New York
Creative duties on Procter & Gamble, General Mills, Miller Brands, and New Business.
2008-2011
Copywriter, Euro RSCG Worldwide, New York
Creative duties on Heineken, Dos Equis, New Business, Reckitt-Benckiser, and Kraft.
2007
Copywriting Intern, BBH, New York
Creative duties on Levis, Miller Lite, Axe, and NYC Tourism.
2006-2008
VCU Brandcenter, Richmond, VA
MS in Mass Communications with a concentration in Advertising Copywriting.
2000-2004
Virginia Commonwealth University, Richmond, VA
BS in Mass Communications with a concentration in Creative Advertising.