Leading arts and culture content agency, CultureShock, expands into the US and Middle East

The client
Cultureshock specialises in creating and distributing premium arts and culture content, including magazines, books, websites, TV, and films, for cultural brands to attract, engage, and retain audiences. Partnering with clients such as Tate, V&A, Sotheby’s, and the Royal Opera House, Cultureshock has established itself as a leader in the arts and culture sector across multiple platforms—from broadcast TV to digital publishing and social media.

The challenge
Founded over 20 years ago, Cultureshock has a highly successful family culture. Recent opportunities for the company have opened up in the Middle East and the US, presenting a new opportunity to scale the business. Cultureshock underwent a strategic review with our partner, Value Squared, identifying the need for an Executive Creative Director (ECD) to free up the Managing Director’s time to focus on building the US strategy and infrastructure. Thrive worked with the CEO to redesign the organisational structure and to align key stakeholders with the new plan. From here, our task was to find an entrepreneurial ECD with a track record of winning new clients and delivering creative excellence.

The result
Thrive successfully placed Mark McCafferty, an award-winning strategic creative leader specialising in ideation and creative campaign strategy. Having been through various scale-ups and mergers, Mark was attracted by the opportunity to work with the team to build Cultureshock globally. Thrive has also hired Mark’s digital marketing team to support his strategic growth plans.