{"id":54865,"date":"2022-04-18T19:17:52","date_gmt":"2022-04-18T19:17:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/graziamagazine.com\/us\/?post_type=articles&p=54865"},"modified":"2022-04-18T19:17:52","modified_gmt":"2022-04-18T19:17:52","slug":"shadow-celebrates-15-years","status":"publish","type":"articles","link":"https:\/\/graziamagazine.com\/us\/articles\/shadow-celebrates-15-years\/","title":{"rendered":"15 Years at SHADOW: How the Company Turned into a Global Force"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Courtesy SHADOW<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

This week, one of the country\u2019s leading creative marketing and communications agencies, SHADOW, celebrated 15 years of award-winning business. Over the course of its lifetime, we\u2019ve seen the emergence of the tablet, the invention of Instagram, and the rise of the influencer. We felt the explosion of tabloid culture, and the onset of cancel culture. The Kardashians arrived. Oh, and there was a pandemic, too. That\u2019s all to say: it\u2019s been quite a time to be in The Biz.<\/p>\n

When SHADOW first opened shop in 2007, co-founders Lisette Sand-Freedman, Brad Zeifman, Michelle Sokoloff and Liza Suloti worked out of Lisette\u2019s apartment. They were small in numbers, but with a client list of heavy hitters like Armani Exchange, Tenjune and Intermix, they were playing up and making waves. Their specialty? Buzz PR. Aligning brands with celebrities, throwing splashy events, and drumming up creative ways to keep their clients\u2019 names in the news. If you were opening a boutique on Robertson Blvd, nightclub in Manhattan, restaurant in Vegas, hotel in Miami Beach, SHADOW was your first call. Before long, the SHADOW apartment became an office in Flatiron; and a team of four became a company of 20. It seemed like behind every pop culture moment, stood a Shadow.<\/p>\n

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Courtesy SHADOW<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

But not long after SHADOW opened \u2014 and seemingly overnight \u2014 traditional PR shops who were accustomed to creating relevance were struggling to hold onto their own. Publicity was becoming an increasingly small piece of a growing marketing machine, and more than a few agencies lost their footing trying to keep pace \u2014 with the culture, with the tech, and with the times.<\/p>\n

“It was the wild wild west \u2014 no one knew what the next month would bring in terms of tools and tech. Brands were looking to their agencies to lean into that white space, take command over emerging platforms, and become savvier, more sophisticated storytellers,” said SHADOW co-founder Lisette Sand-Freedman. “We were so passionate about the space and our clients, we really didn\u2019t hesitate. We dove into the culture, and embraced the turning of the wheel.”<\/p>\n

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Courtesy SHADOW<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Today, SHADOW\u2019s ability to adapt, evolve, and dare we say lean into the chaos, has placed them squarely at the forefront of the field. Not only have they continued to find their media strategy skills in business and consumer press and continue to secure feature stories in Forbes Magazine<\/em>, and dedicated segments on the TODAY Show \u2014 the kind of placements that change businesses overnight \u2014 but they\u2019ve also broadened the agency\u2019s scope to include Influencer, Creative, Experiential, Social, Strategy and Business divisions. With their expanded set of services, they\u2019ve signed the likes of Bentley, Mo\u00ebt Hennessy, and Herschel Supply, while retaining long term clients like American Eagle, Aerie, Pottery Barn Brands, Moroccanoil and e.l.f. Cosmetics who trust SHADOW to evolve with them. In 2018, SHADOW made it official with a sweeping rebrand of their own: they dropped the PR from their name, and never looked back. They were the first agency to do so, and many others followed suit.<\/p>\n

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Courtesy SHADOW<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Agency leadership credits much of Shadow\u2019s success to their willingness to let passionate juniors carve out their own pathways within the company. Their Experiential Division, for example, was created by Jamie D\u2019Attoma, an event-savvy staffer who started out as Brad and Lisette\u2019s assistant in 2009. Their much-lauded Creative Division began as a pitch from Brian Vaughan, a talented account lead who was itching for more. Both Vaughan and D\u2019Attoma were named partners in 2020, along with fashion and retail standout, Erica Larsen.<\/p>\n

“Those of us who have worked here for over a decade can speak to SHADOW\u2019s commitment to fostering and growing talent from within,\u201d said Creative Director and Partner, Brian Vaughan. “Through ten years of wins and losses \u2014 both professional and personal \u2014 SHADOW has been the consistent backdrop (and often the lead character) in the most pivotal scenes of our lives. It might feel unfashionable to describe a workplace in such intimate terms in 2022, but it\u2019s in this kind of environment that we learn to lead with empathy, bring a sense of soul and personal passion to an industry that can feel deeply transactional, and really internalize the belief that we can invent any possibility.”<\/p>\n

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Courtesy SHADOW<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

SHADOW leans into the whacky and avant-garde in order to create campaigns that transcend the noise of the internet. During company-wide brainstorms, every opinion is invited, no matter how big or outrageous. Once they land on the right idea, they appoint the most passionate person in charge and tell them to go \u2014 and to go all-in. This approach, fueled by raw creative instinct, but distilled through professional process, has yielded work like the #AerieREAL Positivity Challenge \u2014 an award-winning early entrant to the landscape of TikTok brand campaigns \u2014 Conair\u2019s stunty \u201cUntie the Knot\u201d mock-wedding event; e.l.f. Cosmetics x Dunkin Donuts Wake-up & Make-up pop up; and American Eagle\u2019s AExMe Prom \u2014 one of the first virtual events attempted by a brand after the onset of the pandemic, which welcomed almost 20,000 attendees. The through line between all of these campaigns suggests that legacy brands are turning to SHADOW to infuse a sense of freshness, and capture a new generation of eyeballs.<\/p>\n

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Courtesy SHADOW<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

None of us know how culture and technology will evolve over the next 15 years \u2014 and how the communications industry will change with it \u2014 but SHADOW is looking forward to the challenges that lie ahead. They\u2019re ready to wrap their arms around the next TikTok and cultivate a new generation of influencers. They\u2019re excited to continue unearthing stories that even brand founders \u2014 too close to their own products \u2014 can\u2019t see. Now 70 people strong, SHADOW is comprised of bonafide students of the zeitgeist, and they\u2019re here to stay.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":26633,"featured_media":54877,"template":"","format":"standard","categories":[23,16],"yoast_head":"\nSHADOW Marketing and Communications Agency Celebrates 15 Years<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Look back at the memorable moments that helped SHADOW turn into the powerhouse in the marketing and communications world\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/graziamagazine.com\/us\/articles\/shadow-celebrates-15-years\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"15 Years at SHADOW: How the Company Turned into a Global Force\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Look back at the memorable 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