HI THIRST, i’m a senior freelance brand strategist with extensive experience on alcohol beverages, brand & agency side.
I’m well-rounded brand strategist that enjoys helping brands understand consumers and culture better, in order to create the right strategy and creative output to communicate to them in the right way.
During my 16+ year career I’ve been fortunate to contribute and create impact for beloved brands across alcohol, sports, lifestyle, fashion and music. Brands like adidas, New Balance, Reebok, Starbucks, Balmain, Manchester United, Asahi, Glenfiddich, and Hendricks. The majority of my roles have been agency side at places like Leo Burnett, ZAK and TBWA, while I also spent an invaluable 4 years in senior brand roles at Chivas Regal and Jameson.
I love working on brands that are part of consumer passions & interests, as well as moments that bring people together. Some of my favourite work in my career has been working on beverage brands with a full breakdown and selected case studies of that experience below, which spans permanent agency and brand roles, as well as more recent freelance experience.
My strategy skillset is channel agnostic, with extensive experience in brand positioning to creative platforms, campaigns to social and digital content, insights to consumer research and sponsorship to cultural marketing.
I write about culture at a site I set up called https://www.vivrant.co.uk/ with a particular focus on the relationship between brands and culture.
I’m a bit of a craft beer nerd and have always enjoyed the work you’ve done on one of my favourite brands Brooklyn Brewery, as well as the output from Thirst in general. I’ve been particularly enjoying the work you’ve done on Proper Job to help bring new life to the often stale cask category. I would love to be considered for any brand strategy support you need.
My day rate is £500 and I’m also open to working on a scope basis per project as well.
FREELANCE WORK
ASAHI SPORTS PARTNERSHIPS
Recently finished a 3 month stint at Havas Play where I led a project for Asahi, to look at their current & potential sports partnerships to define their role in sport and ensure this also complimented the new creative platform being developed by Havas London.
FOUR ROSES BOURBON
In 2023 I worked on Four Roses Bourbon’s first advertising campaign in the UK and developed creative territories to help guide the campaign development, as well as guide the brand on how best to recruit new drinkers and provide an in-depth audience insight piece into them.
MOTH & WOLF
In 2022 & 2023 I worked with Thumbstoppers agency to provide creative strategy and help my old Chivas Brothers colleagues launch the world’s first whiskey inspired by a video game - The Last of Us.
BRAND SIDE
CHIVAS
i joined Pernod Ricard in 2018 where I spent 3 years as a Global Senior Brand Manager working on Chivas Regal. I worked on the global and local rollout of the Success is a Blend platform, product launches and partnerships with Balmain and Manchester United. I also worked on the brand purpose programme, the Chivas Venture and in 2020 I set up the brand’s first Cultural Marketing team as part of the repositioning work on the brand to target what I dubbed, ‘the hustle generation’.
Jameson
in 2021 I started adding an ‘e’ to how I wrote whiskey when i joined Jameson in a Creative Content role where I was responsible for working with the global team to develop and localise various product launches like Jameson Orange and content campaigns, as well as the new global platform ‘Widen the Circle’.
agency SIDE
glenfiddich
While at Gravity Thinking between 2015 - 2016 I worked across a number of global and local Glenfiddich campaigns, brand strategy development and creation of market toolkits. Some of my highlights included comms planning for ‘The Finishing Touch’ to promote the Glenfiddich 21, a rum cask finished expression, as well as the UK team’s Christmas campaign that celebrated the brand’s maverick spirit, by showcasing some Christmas Day mavericks.
hendricks
While at Gravity Thinking, I worked on the social and creative strategy for Hendricks, which included developing the rollout plan for the Hendrick's Phantasmagorical Cogitative Drinking Toppers. Say that five times fast! These toppers led an innovative audio-based treatment programme that could be experienced in bars which gave a truly unusual and unexpected experience enjoying a G&T.
“Warren is a strategic thinker and branding expert. He’s creative and strong in culture and hugely passionate about marketing, entrepreneurship and leading edge brand and experiential activation. Great team player and very personable. Listens well and is empathetic and has high EQ. Well versed on navigating tricky briefs and organisational hierarchies and strong on digital and social as well as insights and analytics. If you need support on a project, call him!”
Fiona Curtin, Planning & Comms Director, Jameson
“I had the pleasure of having Warren as my strategic partner on a complex global piece of business. Warren’s breadth of knowledge and skills made him just as able to have deep strategic direction discussions about consumer profiles and brand messages with the CMO as it did understanding the creative nuance required to get content working in specific social channels. I recommend him to any brand or agency seeking cultural relevance understanding.”
Dan Hocking, Managing Consultant (Worked together at Leo Burnett)
“Warren was a valuable member of my team at Chivas, providing strategic and creative direction on a range of key projects including the Success is a Blend global campaign, which successfully launched in over 50 markets, through to growing our social media presence by developing richer and more engaging content.
His audience and cultural understanding were invaluable in the development of content across our Manchester United partnership, in addition to his involvement in developing the new Chivas brand positioning, providing key insights and direction on how we can win in culture.”
Martin Jaskolowski, Head of Advertising, Chivas Regal
"When it comes to strategy, I highly recommend Warren. He simplifies the complicated and gets to the core of branding. With a clear of understanding of his clients goals, he delivers effective brand strategy to inform effective and long lasting brand identities."
Dan Todd, Co-Founder & Creative Partner, Out of Nothing Studio