Aaron Starkman
Global Chief Creative Officer, Rethink, Canada - President
Aaron Starkman leads Rethink globally as Chief Creative Officer. He has led Rethink to become the 2022 Global Independent Agency of the year (Campaign Magazine), The #1 Independent agency in the World at the Clios 2022, Adage’s 2021 Creative Agency of the Year, earn Ad Age’s # 1 ad in the world this year, The Effies Independent Agency of the year for North America, the #2 ranked Independent agency in the world at D&AD, the #3 ranked Independent agency in the world in Cannes(for 2 years in a row) with 23 Lions and Canada’s agency of the year for the 4th straight year. Aaron’s Creative direction has resulted in NBC News and The Huffington Post calling the agency “viral specialists".
Some of that work includes the recent “Un-burnable Book” for Margaret Atwood and Penguin Books, the Multiple Cannes Gold Lion winning Heinz “Draw Ketchup” campaign, the Gold Lion winning tilted label campaign, the world’s slowest all-red puzzle, the Cannes Lions winning Molson passport fridge and WestJet’s Guinness world record breaking Desert Roulette.
Prior to Rethink, Aaron led CP+B as CCO. Some highlights include his "Prison Visitor" ad for Vim - the most awarded cleaning product ad in advertising history, and additional Gold Lions in Cannes for Corus & IKEA.
Aaron is one of the top 5 CCO’s in the world (both Adage & Campaign Magazine 2022 - recently Campaign awarded him as the #1 CCO in the world), he’s currently the #1 ranked CCO in Canada & he’s won more Cannes Gold lions on more brands than any other Creative in Canada. Aaron is also on Campaign’s prestigious 40 over 40 list.
Other than industry accolades, Aaron’s work has been singled out by the mainstream press (Buzzfeed named one of his ads the # 1 commercial in the history of the Cannes festival, CNN and Jimmy Kimmel have discussed work he’s led multiple times and Ellen Degeneres declared one of his tv spots as her 'favorite of all time').
Aaron frequently judges award shows including Cannes, Clios and the One Show (most recently he served on the Effies inaugural Global “best of the best awards” grand jury.) He also enjoys writing columns, speaking at events locally and abroad - Seoul, Korea being a personal highlight. Aaron also tries to inspire young industry professionals from around the globe with his podcast, IOFA - Adweek’s advertising podcast of the year.
