Creative

Cases

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Clients

Client Start Year End Year
McDonald's Corporation 1994 Current
State Farm Insurance 1998 Current
Tobacco Free Florida 2009 Current
PNC Bank 2011 Current
Molson Coors 2017 Current
PepsiCo 2018 Current
Lilly 2018 Current
Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center 2019 Current
Wells Fargo Bank 2020 Current
CVS Health 2020 Current

About

Alma is an agency of modern culture marketers with diversity and inclusion in its DNA. Unlocking culture through effective emotional storytelling is at the core of what we do.

Powered by thought leadership, creative effectiveness and excellence since 1994, we honed our skills in segmentation starting with Hispanic, and have taken that skillset and applied it to the myriad segments that represent modern culture in America.

To truly connect with those segments, it is not enough to tell great stories. To drive connections and our clients’ business growth, we have to tell the right stories. To do that, we go deep to unlock deep cultural insights and help brands find their soul.

We do this by mining for specific consumer insights to create authentic, emotionally-driven stories that impact brands’ bottom line.

This approach has made us #1 agency in the US, first-ever multicultural, with 32 Cannes Lions, 21 EFFIES and seven-time recognition on AdAge’s Agency A-List, as well as other national and international accolades.

People

  • Luis Miguel Messianu

    Luis Miguel Messianu

    Creative Chairman, CEO

    Born to Romanian parents and raised in Mexico City, Luis Miguel Messianu has played a respectable and influential role in the most important developments of the U.S. Hispanic market during an advertising career that spans three decades.    His trajectory is defined by a conscious effort to help pioneer the melding of marketing niches into a nuanced and evolving total market. His award-winning work for multinationals such as McDonald’s, State Farm, Clorox, MillerCoors, Sprint, Blue Cross Blue Shield, General Motors, Coca-Cola, Nestlé, Goodyear, Quaker, and L’Oréal, is a testament to that effort.   In 1994, when advertising to U.S. Hispanics was an afterthought in a business plan, Luis Miguel started his own Hispanic agency, winning soon after the McDonald’s and State Farm accounts. Numerous award-winning campaigns later, both clients still trust their multicultural strategy to Luis Miguel’s creative shop, alma, which is now the largest multicultural agency in the country.   Luis Miguel’s contributions to the industry have been recognized by many organizations. In 2015, he was named Legend Honoree by ADCOLOR and in 2019 he was inducted into the Culture Marketing Council (CMC) Hall of Fame.   Luis Miguel has always been passionate about mentoring and educating a new generation of Multicultural advertising professionals and has been a member of the Miami Ad School Board and faculty since the school's inception. He is also the Chairman of the Advisory Board at the newest Miami Ad School in Punta Cana, Dominican Republic. He recently completed with honors his Executive MBA at the Berlin School of Creative Leadership.
  • Isaac Mizrahi

    Isaac Mizrahi

    President & CEO

    Isaac is a Brazilian marketing master and economist, who has spent most of his 25+ career years working with brands such as Coca-Cola, BellSouth International, and Sprint Nextel, in several different capacities and covering multiple geographies.   Isaac began his career as an analyst, media and brand manager at British American Tobacco in Brazil. He then headed various key marketing strategies for Coca-Cola and BellSouth International in Brazil and the United States. Isaac also led multicultural marketing for Sprint Nextel, for which he was recognized by Ad Week’s “Marketing y Medios” as U.S. Hispanic Marketer of the Year in 2006. Over the past decade, Isaac transitioned from the client side to the agency side of the business by joining alma as SVP, Managing Director. Today he is the co-president of the agency, acting as Chief Operations Officer. Isaac also serves as the Chair of the Board of the Culture Marketing Council (CMC) and is a contributor for Forbes, where he publishes monthly articles on multicultural marketing insights and trends.
  • Alvar Suñol

    Alvar Suñol

    President & Chief Creative Officer

    Alvar is a Catalán driven by curiosity and adrenaline in equal measure. His appetite has led him to dominate agencies in Europe, South America and now the United States, earning major awards for clients everywhere he has been. Currently, Alvar is alma’s creative guru, where he has led the agency to land numerous creative and effective awards, including 21 prestigious Cannes Lions (including two golds), 25 Clios, more than 10 One Show pencils, 1 D&AD Wood Pencil, more than 90 FIAP Sol, more than 70 Sol de Iberoamérica, and more than 80 Ojos de Iberoamérica. On the Directory Big Won ranking, his team developed the most awarded radio and print campaigns of 2016 and were in the top 10 most creatively awarded agencies in the United States that same year. Throughout his career, Alvar has led creative development for companies such as McDonald’s, State Farm, Clorox, Sprint, Jeep, MillerCoors, Netflix, Ford, Volkswagen, Unilever, HSBC, BBVA, Santander, Nestlé, Coca-Cola, Nike, Pfizer, and Cadbury Adams. He was named “Creative of the Year” at El Ojo de Iberoamérica in 2016 and 2017, and has participated as a judge at Cannes Lions, Clio, El Ojo de Iberoamérica, El Sol de Iberoamérica, FIAP, Effie Awards, Wave, Círculo Creativo, among others. Before joining alma and moving back to the states, Alvar served as General Creative Director at Bassat Ogilvy Madrid and was a member of the Executive Committee at Group Ogilvy España. He also served as Vice President and Executive Creative Director of JWT Mexico.
  • Angela Battistini

    Angela Battistini

    EVP Account Services

    A native Venezuelan, Angela is a passionate advocate for brands and an able cross-cultural translator throughout more than 20 years of advertising experience that started in Latin America. She expanded that knowledge in the US by focusing in the management of multinational brands with focus on regional thought leadership and stewardship, as well as honing in on the ever-growing US Hispanic segment. Her focus has been in driving business growth by constantly evolving the agency structure and skillsets needed to meet the demand of ever-changing business strategies across very distinct categories including Retail, Pharma, CPG, Telecom, Automotive and Technology. Angela has lead communications for global brands such as McDonald’s, Eli Lilly, General Mills, Sprint, Volkswagen, Colgate Palmolive, and more recently Amazon and Google.
  • Michelle Headley

    Michelle Headley

    EVP Operations

    29 years ago, Michelle Headley started her career with a summer job at a small Miami agency and never left. Her dedication, commitment, and leadership have been instrumental in that agency evolving into Alma DDB, the fourth largest Hispanic advertising agency in the United States and one of the most innovative and awarded. Michelle’s long tenure attests to her ability to continuely grow, change, and above all, nurture creativity across the entire company. She is passionate about bringing ideas with alma (soul) to life, and she finds inspiration in the agency’s strong creative heritage and non-conformist culture. Born in Miami, 100% Latina and 100% American, Alma DDB’s resident “Cuarto Cubana’s” career has been dedicated to the development and growth of the Hispanic consumer market. This journey began almost three decades ago, when Hispanic marketing relied on stereotypes or general market adaptations. Currently, Latinos are the leading segment in consumption growth and represent the New America, which is more diverse, interrelated, and multicultural than ever before. Michelle is extremely proud to work with a team comprising over 28 different nationalities and feels that diversity is the creative force behind extremely successful campaigns for clients. Starting in the creative department on the production team, Michelle rose to Director of Production. For 20 years, she helped create innovative, insighful, and successful campaigns for blue chip brands such as McDonald’s (a 20+ years relationship), State Farm Insurance, Clorox, Sprint, Anheuser-Busch, Tylenol, Royal Caribbean, Hanes, and Florida Anti-Tobacco, among others. In 2007 she was promoted to VP of Operations where she built many of the key departments from the ground up including: Human Resources, Communications/PR, Project Management and an internal Production Studio. Today, Michelle is a partner at Alma DDB and its SVP of Operations. She manages the day-to-day business, overseeing and optimizing agency procedures in order to attain strong business results and growth. Her accomplishments include leading the submissions that resulted in Alma DDB being named to this year’s Advertising Age prestigious 2016 A-List as well as in 2012 and 2010, and Multicultural Agency of the year in 2015 and 2014. She has collaborated on projects which have won eleven Cannes Lions, Effies, Clios, One Show, FIAP, El Sol, ANA Multicultural Excellence Awards and AAF Mosaic Awards among others. In 2014, she was nominated to the 4A’s Florida Council Board of Directors. Michelle is a self-described orchid junkie, avid cyclist, and enjoys traveling to learn about other cultures. She is married and the stepmother to a college student attending the oldest liberal arts women’s college, Mount Holyoke.
  • Angela Rodriguez

    Angela Rodriguez

    SVP Strategic Insights

    A lover of words, coffee, and culture, Angela is the head of strategy at alma Advertising. She has spent nearly 20 years uncovering the interplays of the global, US and Latin cultures, helping brands succeed with Hispanic and non-Hispanic consumers alike. 
 Angela is responsible for leading research, the development of consumer insights and the creation of inspiring creative strategies, and the execution of post-campaign analytics for alma's roster of brands together with her team of strategists and analysts. She also heads up alma’s Culture Lab, an innovation think tank that leads the marketplace in Cultural Curation, Consulting and Research. 
Angela agrees that everyone loves their kids but knows that the way we demonstrate that love varies widely by culture, heritage and experience. Understanding those cultural nuances means understanding when to go traditional vs when to go trendy vs when to be universal. This is essential to good marketing in a world where messages need to be more personal than ever. 
 Among the brands she currently helps grow by connecting them with consumers in more culturally relevant ways are: Pepsi, McDonald’s, State Farm, Sprint, Cerveza Sol, Miller Lite, Clorox, Tobacco Free Florida, Memorial Sloan Kettering, and Lilly.
  • Leo Peet

    Leo Peet

    SVP Finance

    Over 15 years experience in the marketing/advertising industry, Leo has been with Alma for the past ten years. The other five were between Leo Burnett WW as Regional Finance, and Contacto Marketing and Communications (Agency owned by Leo Burnett) as Chief Financial Officer. Leo was selected by CFO of Leo Burnett World Wide as one of two Brand Managers to lead the Sarbanes Oxley initiative across the Globe. He also has over ten years experience in Governmental accounting with Federally Funded Miccosukee Tribe of Indians of Florida (mainly by the Department of the Interior and the Department of Health) as Senior Financial Accountant and as Controller of the Miccosukee Resort and Convention Center, and other tribally owned enterprises (highly regulated by the Gaming Commission). Some of the brands Leo has worked with throughout his career include McDonalds, Philip Morris, State Farm, Procter and Gamble, Kellogg’s, Diageo, Sony Ericsson, Americatel, Visit Florida, DOH – Tobacco Free Florida, Rosetta Stone, Leap Wireless, Clorox, Anheuser Busch Corporation, H & R Block, Hyundai, Perdue, NY Lottery, Capital One Bank, Marshalls/TJX Companies, Royal Caribbean Cruise Lines, Terra, Visa International, Cricket Wireless, Perdue and a few more.
  • Michael Sotelo

    Michael Sotelo

    VP Digital

    Michael was the Head of Marketing for U.S. Multicultural and, previously, Pan Regional Latin America for Facebook based out of Miami, FL. Before Facebook, he worked at SapientNitro and WorldMedia Interactive, managing teams across Miami and Atlanta, spearheading digital strategy initiatives for clients such as NASCAR, Coca-Cola, Burger King, Norwegian Cruise Lines, Regions Bank, BB&T Bank, Bank of America, LAN/TAM Airways, Aeroméxico, Air Canada, Enterprise/Alamo rental cars and several others. Prior to entering the digital agency scene, Michael also held the position of Sr. Strategist of e-Commerce for Celebrity Cruise lines working with all internal and external disciplines within the company to guarantee efficiencies in increasing revenue through the digital space in an effort to drive direct business through the corporate site.  He and his team were instrumental in the success of our work the Narcos Season 2 launch, which garnered great business results for Netflix and created an engagement with consumers on social media.   Mike also serves on a municipal board and the Miracle Mile Rejuvenation Steering Committee for the City of Coral Gables, where he resides with his wife and two children. He holds a Bachelor’s degree from Florida State University and a Master’s Degree from Florida International University.   On a personal note, Mike is an avid golfer, a huge fan of alternative rock music as well as a concertgoer. Aside from his family, he is inspired by great creative and strategic advertisers who realize the importance of connecting brands and consumers in an organic way through the use of storytelling and personalized content. Music is also a constant inspiration for him throughout his day-to-day.
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