book180 Grads

It’s that time again! Time to meet the new book180 graduates. From book180: “These 18 creatives have spent the last 180 days of their life in portfolio school. For 6 months, they’ve worked together from all over the world, fine-tuned their design and writing skills, created so many book-worthy pieces, killed so many babies, panicked, had a lot of fun, and now, we’re so proud to watch them graduate! As you can see in their portfolios, they’re all winners. The work this semester was so insightful, for brands like Raid, Chiquita Bananas, Carvel, Coppertone, Applebees, SPAM, and Guinness Open Gate Brewery created in partnership with Jack Morton Worldwide. Call them, beep them, scoop them up before another agency does!” Do it!

book180 grad portfolio links: book180.com/books

Rob Hall

Rob is a copywriter/ACD at FP7 McCann in Dubai, UAM. His site features projects for brands like TCS, Rolex, Hardee’s, Lux, McDonald’s, Volkswagen, and STA. Don’t miss “Ketchup Insurance” for Heinz (Bronze Lion, Gold at New York Festivals). From the write-up on Rob’s site: “a staggering 48% of Heinz customers have had ketchup accidents. While we can’t stop mishaps happening, we can cover them. Because if it’s worth the risk, it has to be Heinz. So, inspired by 57 real incidents found on social media, we launched a real, legally-binding insurance program offering customers coverage against 57 ketchup customer-inspired accidents.” Brilliant.

Portfolio: robhall.work

Stephen Dalton

Stephen is a copywriter/CD currently serving as CD at Lumenati, a new-ish production company in Denver. Previously, he spent time at CP+B, BBDO, 72andSunny, WorkInProgress, and freelanced all over the place. His portfolio features work for brands like Domino’s Pizza, Spotify, Google, Jimmy John’s, Charles Schwab, Applebee’s, Village Inn, Nescafé, Mike’s Hard Lemonade (featuring Mike Tyson). He and his partner also came up with the infamous “Captain Obvious” campaign for Hotels.com (love it). So much good stuff. Grab a cold beverage, fire up the laptop, click the link below, and enjoy!

Portfolio: cargocollective.com/stephendalton

David Lieberman

David is a senior copywriter (and fellow Oregon Duck alum) who is on the hunt for his next big thing. Previously, he was at Media.Monks where he “conceptualized, wrote and pitched work that showcases the possibilities and potential of emerging technologies across a variety of channels, working with global innovators at PayPal and Meta — specifically within Reality Labs and WhatsApp.” In addition to tech brands, David’s site also features work for Lululemon, Nike and Jordan from his time at AKQA and Nike. (So many killer brands, sheesh.) Can’t wait to see where David lands!

Portfolio: david-lieberman.com

Matt McEwan

Matt is a new copywriter based in Los Angeles on the hunt for his first gig. His student portfolio features projects for brands like Spotify, Tidal, Stella & Chewy’s, Casper, Grammarly, Dramamine, FujiFilm, Body Armor, and Diablo Extra Course Sandpaper—which is rough. (Ha.) Can’t wait to see where he lands!

Portfolio: mattmcewan.co

VCU Brandcenter 2024 Grads

Ashley Sommardahl, Associate Director at VCU Brandcenter in Richmond, VA, was nice enough to send MC their 2024 graduating class portfolios—which are broken out by concentration: Copywriting, Art Direction, Strategy, Experience Design, and Account/Brand Management. Can’t say enough good things about Brandcenter and the books coming out of it. Consistently stellar, strategic work that shines. Get ’em while they’re hot!

Portfolios: brandcenter.vcu.edu/student-portfolios

Wanted: Copy Manager, Walmart Creative Studio

Travis Robertson (Group Director, Social Creative, Experiences & Copywriting, Walmart Creative Studio) is on the hunt for a “great conceptual powerhouse of a writer” to join their team—in any one of their four hubs: LA, SF, NY or Bentonville, AR. MC used to work with Mr. Robertson at Target back in the day and can attest to the fact that Travis knows how to pull together a killer team. This is a great opportunity!

To learn more or to apply, click here.

Austin Hohiemer

Austin is a copywriter/front end developer at Bullhorn in Lexington, Kentucky. From his site: “Before I was either of those things, I was a decent touring musician, a mediocre barista, and a pretty bad peach seller. Turns out I’m allergic to peaches anyway.” Ha! You can tell that Austin is a front end developer as soon as you land on his site—super cool semi-OCD-ish organization of the projects on his Work page, including tags for Copywriting, Concept, Brand Voice, Naming, and Web Development. Most of projects are for regional brands like Gates Auto Family, Stockton Mortgage, Taco Tico, Peoples Exchange Bank, and Screamin’ Mimi’s. Always a treat to see work from other parts of the country. Dig it.

Portfolio: hohiemer.com

Denver Ad School Grads

On the hunt for some new creative talent? Today is your day. A new crop of DAD grad portfolios dropped recently and they’re ready for your eyeballs. From DAD, “This group really pushed themselves to make the biggest, boldest work they could and boy did they deliver. There’s a TON of talent here and they’re open to opportunities on the east coast, west coast, and everything in between.” Love it.

View DAD graduate portfolios here: denveradschool.com/portfolios

book180 2023 Fall Grads

Sarah Latz, Founder/Director of book180 online portfolio school, was nice enough to send MC their 2023 Fall grad portfolios. (View at the link below.) What’s more fun than clicking through student portfolios, checking out fresh new work, and trying to guess where they’re going to land for their first gigs? Nothing. Nothing is more fun. Congrats to all of the new book180 grads—go get ’em!

Book180 Fall Grad Portfolios: book180.com/books

More from Sarah at book180:

These students hail from all over the country. After 180 days of hard work, they’ve created campaigns that we’re SO proud of: digital activations for brands like Kraft, Coinbase, Coke, and Dove; stellar partnerships for brands like Dungeons & Dragons and Monster Jam; cool experiential work for brands like Polly Pocket; and amazing social good work including a campaign for Oreo.

We can’t wait to see them go out and take the industry by storm!

book180 is the only 6-month, fully online,100% female-owned portfolio school in the world. Because we’re online, we have students and instructors from all over the world, giving students a truly global perspective on their work. For the Spring 2024 semester, we have instructors lined up from LA, NYC, Chicago, Miami, Durham and Buenos Aires, and students enrolled from across the country, including Hawaii, and even an international student in Seoul. We’re out to continue giving more people access to the portfolio school and creative advertising world.

Tucker Jackson

Tucker is a new copywriter in Nashville on the hunt for a FT gig. Lots of hilarity all over his site, including a Gen Z campaign for Candy Crush that’s all about thumbs, a lazy campaign for DoorDash, and a whole bunch of social work for KFC. From his About page: “I don’t know where you live yet so I made this site to show you all this work. I recognize that it’s rough around the edges, but then, so am I. Think of how smooth I might be with your help.” Can’t wait to see where Tucker lands.

Portfolio: tuckerjackson.com

Ciaran Watkins

Ciaran is a senior copywriter at VML Health in Manchester, UK, previously at Havas and TBWA. One of the best things about MC is getting to see portfolios from all parts of the world and all kinds of product categories. Ciaran’s portfolio is part-pharma, part-consumer and features campaigns for everything from managing MS during the pandemic to getting “That New Toy Feeling” for Smyths Toys Superstores. Toward the end of his portfolio there’s a password-protected project (you’ll need to email him to get the password)—and a catch-all “other stuff I’m proud of” page.

Portfolio: ciaranwatkins.com

Ben Heller

Ben is a freelance copywriter/CD based in the San Francisco Bay Area. He’s got a whopping 27 projects on his site for brands like Mobile 1, Sling, SVB, Facebook, Instagram, Pedigree, and MLB. For Schwab, Ben wrote “around 10 TV spots featuring a character named Carl, a bad broker anti-hero played by the hilarious Salvator Xuereb.” Schwab! Good times.

Portfolio: benheller.dunked.com

Brad Meyers

Brad is a copywriter/CD in San Francisco, formerly at McCann and Digitas, on the hunt for his next gig. Since his last post on MC (back on 01.25.16), he’s added all kinds of killer projects to his site, including work for Xbox, Halo and Minecraft. But don’t miss one of the all-time social media greats, Taco Bell Blackout. A classic! Can’t wait to see where Brad lands next.

Portfolio: cargocollective.com/bradleymeyers

Gary Cohen

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Gary is a freelance copywriter/CD in Boston. Love his headline writing. Clicking through his site, there are smart lines for brands like Nikon, Tufts, Timberland, Range Rover, Time Magazine, and Megamillions (and that’s just the first few projects). Also, don’t miss his About page. Gary tells the story of how he got into copywriting, some of the giants he’s worked with, and what matters most to him—in just a few short, well-crafted paragraphs. That’s how you do it.

Portfolio: garycohen.myportfolio.com

Jeff Johnson

Jeff is a freelance copywriter based in Tampa, FL. What a cool variety of projects on his site for brands you’ve definitely heard of—and some you maybe haven’t. Those include Back Market (above), Oatly, Outdoorsy, Kenvue, OnHub, Vote.org, and something called Google Chrome. (Ha!) His site is divided into Work (start there), Writing, More Ad Stuff, Branding, About, and Contact. When he reached out to MC, Jeff sent a very cool PDF version of his site. (If you’re an agency recruiter, worth asking for.) Good times.

Portfolio: thisisjeffjohnson.me

Chris Elzinga

Chris is a freelance copywriter/CD/ACD who has worked with a long list of killer agencies over the years—and has the portfolio to prove it. Since his last post on MC (way back on 07.15.13), he’s added work for Boost Mobile, Google, Virgin Mobile, Oakland A’s, Playstation, Microsoft, and a bunch of other big brands. Be sure not to miss the first project on his site for Glad cherry blossom-scented trash bags, “Le Party.” Ridiculous.

Portfolio: cargocollective.com/chriselzinga

Autin Pak

Austin is a copywriter/social media specialist at Movement Strategy in Los Angeles. His site is currently divided into “Work” which features four produced social projects for Amazon and Tractor Beverage Company, and “College Adfolio” which features eight projects from his time at Boston University College of Communication. Dig it.

Portfolio: austinpak.com

Diana Hou

Diana is a new copywriter in NYC searching for her first junior copywriter position after studying at Adhouse and interning at Gus. In her past lives, she’s been a data analyst in corporate, non-profit, and political campaign environments, and briefly a mushroom farmer. Can’t wait to see where she lands!

Portfolio: dianahou.com

Kyle Harrison

Kyle is a freelance copywriter/ACD/”long-haired dude” in Nashville, previously at shops like McCann NY, RPA, and Translation. He’s got a whopping 25 projects on his site at the time of this post—including work for Verizon, Peloton, Honda, WhatsApp, AT&T, and more. Don’t miss the first project in his portfolio, an Emmy-winning short film dealing with what we all felt during the pandemic, featuring Sarah Jessica Parker and Sufjan Stevens. So cool.

Portfolio: kyledouglasharrison.com

Shelley Barker

Shelley is a senior copywriter/CD in Los Angeles on the hunt for her next gig, previously at Saatchi in Seattle. Since her last post on MC (back on 02.03.17), she’s been busy. All kinds of cool projects on her site for clients like Hardee’s, Hot Wheels (above), T-Mobile, Microsoft, Toyota, and more. Can’t wait to see where she lands!

Portfolio: shelleybarkerwrites.com

Nick Rudie

Nick is a freelance copywriter/CD in Minneapolis. Lots of inspiring lifestyle and outdoor projects on his site for brands like Supra Boats, Jack Link’s, CLIF Bar, Moomba Boats, Polaris, Catch Co., and Bauer Hockey (above). Makes MC want to get out there this weekend and do something active. Or, write a campaign about other people getting out there and doing something active. (Hmm.) Dig it!

Portfolio: nickrudie.com

Mick DiMaria

Mick is a freelance copywriter/CD in Los Angeles. Since his last post on MC (back on 12.15.10), he’s added a ton of projects to his site—so many, it takes two pages of thumbnails to get to them all. On the second page of projects, don’t miss “Heart Beats,” part of a branded content campaign he did with SoulPancake/Participant for Denny’s restaurants called “Denny’s Reconnection Stories.” Great story and great storytelling. Time for an update!

Portfolio: cargocollective.com/mickdimaria

Julia Sumpf

Julia is a freelance senior copywriter/CD in Berlin. (Hello, Berlin!) All kinds of beautiful storytelling on her site for brands like Google, eBay, MINI, Spotify, and more. Most of her site is in German, but the descriptions are in English and the stories go beyond language. Don’t miss her short films for Google Pixel. Nice.

Portfolio: juliasumpf.com

Ryan Hammill

Ryan is a Principal Creative Director at Amazon Web Services in Los Angeles. So cool to see yet another talented writer/CD take their agency skills in-house and do something great. All kinds of awesome projects for Amazon AWS and Amazon Music on Ryan’s site, plus work for other brands like UCLA, Savers, T-Mobile, and Microsoft. Dig it.

Portfolio: ryanhammill.com

Sam Podolsky

Sam is a brand new copywriter after graduating from Denver Ad School. (Congrats, Sam!) What’s more fun than seeing a student portfolio right after graduation? Nothing. Nothing is more fun. Don’t miss Sam’s terrifying “Killer” campaign for Listerine (above). Perfect for fans of true crime. And fresh breath!

Portfolio: sam-podolsky.com

Newton Cox

Newton is a senior copywriter freelancing in Los Angeles, previously at Innocean and Deutsch. Since his last post on MC (back on 09.20.16), he’s been busy. All kinds of new projects on his site for Hyundai and Volkswagen, plus some of his work from Jimmy Kimmel Live back in the day. (So cool.) Time for an update!

Portfolio: newtcox.com

Johnny Michael

Johnny is a senior copywriter at Razorfish in Miami. His portfolio features separate pages for Directing, Advertising Copywriting, Filmmaking, Photography, and Writing. His advertising page features work for Jeep, Chevrolet, Corteva Agriscience, and others. It also features a page where you can hire Johnny for one full year for the low, low price of $119,999.00 (ha!). First time MC has seen that in a portfolio. Dig it.

Portfolio: hijohnny.com

Ben McCoy

Ben is a freelance copywriter/ACD in NYC who has done work for agencies like Saatchi, McCann, and Barbarian for clients like Crest, USAA, and Samsung (above). His “Too Easy” campaign shows how “Samsung’s Smart TV can do just about anything from connecting with your smart devices to customizing its built-in features.” Like cancelling your kid’s band practice. Daaaaaad.

Portfolio: bendoesads.com