2018 was a year of record growth for Walker Sands. Our revenues increased by 56%, a new Seattle office joined our existing locations in Chicago and San Francisco and we added 36 new employees across all three offices, nudging us over the 100 mark and ending the year with 114 employees.
To top it off, we were honored to see this growth happen alongside great industry recognition. In addition to earning a spot on the Inc. 5000 for the sixth consecutive year, our teams produced incredible work that has been recognized by the Holmes Report In2 SABRE, PR News’ Platinum, PRSA Skyline and AVA Digital awards.
All of these accomplishments are a true testament to our incredible employees. Driven by a collective goal to provide our clients with the best work possible, our teams have excelled at working together to provide smart, innovative, integrated marketing strategies, and our achievements of the past year wouldn’t be possible without them.
As the agency continues to grow and service more large-scale integrated accounts, we are making sure we have the structure and people in place to match. In the first round of elevations that will help support this growth, we’re excited to announce five new leadership positions that will strengthen our Client Services, Demand Generation, Branding & Web and Creative Services departments:
- Dave Parro, Senior Vice President of Client Services – Since joining Walker Sands in 2012, Dave has been instrumental in establishing and growing Walker Sands’ integrated marketing offerings. He leads the Client Services department focused on bringing together all Walker Sands services to meet the needs of clients and drive measurable business results. Dave also serves as the senior strategist for some of the agency’s largest accounts, including Miller Heiman Group and CCC Information Services.
- John Fairley, Senior Vice President of Demand Generation – John joined Walker Sands in 2007 and has been a key player in driving the development and sophistication of the digital services group. As a strategy architect and technical director, John will focus his efforts on continuing to expand Walker Sands’ Demand Generation offering as it grows in complexity and scale – with the department having grown 80 percent over the course of 2018.
- Brendan Shea, Vice President of Creative Services – Brendan will lead Walker Sands’ unified design and content teams. In the last year, Brendan has brought new processes, integrations and expertise that have shaped impactful content programs for clients such as Elastic Path and Addison Group.
- Tim Morral, Vice President of Editorial Content – Tim joined Walker Sands in 2011 and in his time has directly created content for more than 175 clients. He will continue to oversee content quality and innovation.
The accelerated growth we saw in 2018 truly would not have been possible without these leaders helping to drive our agency forward, and we can’t wait to see their innovative work continue.