Vice Media CMO Steps Down to Lead Public Affairs and Marketing Firm

Vice Media Group Chief Marketing Officer Nadja Bellan-White will leave the company in mid-December to accept a role as chief executive of SS+K, a marketing and public affairs firm based in New York.

Bellan-White will be the first person to hold the CEO title at SS+K, whose clients have included social-media company Meta Platforms, the Democratic National Committee and President Biden’s inaugural committee, according to the agency. She will report to co-founders and partners Lenny Stern and Rob Shepardson, with all senior managers reporting to Bellan-White.

“It was time. I accomplished what I needed to accomplish,” said Bellan-White regarding her three-year tenure as Vice’s first head of global marketing. Her responsibilities at the media conglomerate, which was acquired out of bankruptcy over the summer, included promoting its various brands and managing their relationships with advertising partners.

SS+K approached Bellan-White several months ago regarding the CEO job and hired her, in part, to help raise awareness of its own brand, according to Stern.

Bellan-White said she was attracted to the idea of helping consumer brands and advocacy organizations navigate areas of intense sociopolitical tension, particularly at a time when many ad agencies have been hit by slowing growth in clients’ budgets.

“The impact that SS+K has had and will continue to make is not always done or seen in the headlines, but it’s done in the shadows sometimes, which is equally important,” she said.

SS+K was founded in 1993 by three former political consultants and later acquired by London-based ad holding company M&C Saatchi. A majority of the firm’s work involves brand marketing for organizations such as New York-based hospital chain Mount Sinai Health System and Iceland’s official department of tourism. But it also frequently produces advocacy campaigns related to public policy issues or overtly political messaging, according to Stern. The firm, for example, worked on youth outreach during both of President Barack Obama’s campaigns.

Recent SS+K campaigns have promoted banking firm JP Morgan’s investments in the Detroit metropolitan area and Meta’s efforts to address parental concerns over teenagers’ use of the Instagram platform. The firm also worked on projects related to President Biden’s 2020 presidential campaign and produced a 2022 film starring Tom Hanks that summarized the president’s first year in office. SS+K hopes to be involved in Biden’s 2024 campaign in some capacity, said Stern.

“We live and breathe this, both on the business side and the political side,” he said.

SS+K employs approximately 60 people and plans to hire more in early 2024, said Stern. M&C Saatchi doesn’t publicly break out SS+K’s revenue or other financial details.

Bellan-White’s departure comes at a tumultuous time for Vice, whose sale out of bankruptcy to its lenders including Fortress Investment Group and Soros Fund Management valued the company at approximately $225 million.

Vice has gone through multiple rounds of layoffs this year, many of which affected its digital news operations. Former CEO Nancy Dubuc left the company in February, and one of her successors, co-CEO Hozefa Lokhandwala, stepped down last week, leaving former Chief Financial Officer Bruce Dixon as its sole CEO.

Vice is currently evaluating its marketing team and may announce changes in the near future, but is not actively looking to fill Bellan-White’s role, according to a person familiar with the matter.

Before joining Vice, Bellan-White held several executive-level roles at ad holding company WPP, serving as executive partner of the Ogilvy agency and CEO of its operations in Africa.

Write to Patrick Coffee at [email protected]