Alma, the advertising agency, has recently announced the appointment of Isaac Mizrahi as its new CEO, replacing Luis Miguel Messianu, who is leaving the company to take over as McDonald's new global chief creative officer.

The new role assumed by Mizrahi, who will maintain his position as co-president of Alma alongside Alvar Suñol, sets an important precedent in this agency, as it is the first time that a new executive director has been appointed since the multicultural agency changed its name from “del Rivero Messianu" in 2007. As part of this transition, Mizrahi will step down as director of operations, a role that he has held since 2015.

“I've been very involved with every aspect of the business with Alvar so there is nothing new that's coming to my plate. I'm going to probably be more visible to some relationships from a corporate standpoint that I haven't been in the past, but honestly, I don't foresee significant changes. If you were a little fly on the wall, you would see that in every internal agency meeting, every interaction, the three of us were always talking. We have a very similar vision of where we are and where we need to be,” said Mizrahi. 

“Natural Evolution”

Alma's new CEO, who will be responsible for the day-to-day operations and business growth aspects of the Miami-based agency, does not expect to see any significant changes from his previous  functions. 

“We have reached a level of maturity that I've been able to have a great succession plan under me with Isaac and Alvar and the rest of the leadership team. The reality is that the last few years I've been giving them space to develop their own leadership. So this is just a natural evolution. It’s time for both of them to really take on the C-level of the agency and it’s also the natural evolution of any agency,” noted Messianu, the outgoing CEO, who despite his new role will be part of “key presentations, key new business pitches, and special relationships” with clients, such as Wells Fargo, Pepsi and McDonald's Hispanic U.S. accounts.

McDonald's became Alma's first client when Messianu founded the agency in 1994.

With high expectations for Alma, especially after completing 12 consecutive years of revenue growth, Mizrahi's goal is to close more business and attract more clients for the agency who are part of an industry, such as mobile and telecommunications, accounts in which Hispanics represent the majority within the growth process of a brand.

“Luis Miguel will never stop being our founder and chairman, and he is ever-present through the agency's culture and the creative environment he has built. I look forward to taking things to the next level by building upon the success of our creatively effective work,” Suñol underlined when assuming as co-president along with Mizrahi.