Role Strengthens Schawk's Commitment to Creative Leadership

CHICAGO, IL, – Schawk, Inc., a leading provider of brand development and deployment services enabling companies of all sizes to connect their brands with consumers, announced the appointment of Lor Gold to global chief creative officer at Schawk. This position will be responsible for stewarding and developing a creative vision across Schawk in support of the expression of brands across consumer touchpoints at home, on the go, at the store and on the shelf.

The appointment of Gold, with his extensive brand management and strategic, creative, executional, and marketing expertise, emphasizes Schawk's continued commitment to deepen its creative leadership talent to help drive a differentiated competitive advantage for its clients.

Gold has focused his 25-year career on envisioning and creating innovative branded promotions, in-store and online retail experiences, and strategic shopper marketing where he fused the form and function of shopper behavior with newly conceived digital technology to create imaginative new brand experiences for consumers.

"We are fortunate to have Lor lead our talented team of creative directors around the globe to deliver best-in-class creative," said David Schawk, president and chief executive officer. "With Lor's visionary leadership and highly collaborative style, we are confident he will harness the creative energy within our global footprint to help our clients win at any point of consumer influence."

Gold served as executive vice president and chief creative officer at Draftfcb Chicago. There, he helped reshape the company from a very large, very traditional direct marketing agency to a creative agency guided by insights, analytics, technology, and channel development for companies including Nokia, Burger King, CVS, Kellogg Company, and The Procter & Gamble Company. Under Gold's creative leadership, Draftfcb was named "Creative Agency Hothouse" by The Procter & Gamble Company, the only agency at the time to receive this distinction, and the first agency of its kind to receive the Ad Age 5-star, A+ rating.

Previously, he also served as managing director and chief creative officer of Rivet Worldwide, a key component of Interpublic Group's portfolio of advertising and marketing communications agencies in support of Lowe+Partners globally.

Additional previous experience includes the development, repositioning, and refocusing of multiple agencies and digital technology innovators, including NPA, a Los Angeles- and New York-based advertising innovator whose original founders created the Wild Postings Viral Communications Model, EZ-PIC, a paperless instant digital coupon marketing technology embedded within the scanning systems of 2,000 grocery stores throughout the United States, and TimeZoneOne, an off-shore creative development group with offices in Christchurch, New Zealand, and Chicago, Illinois. Marquee clients at NPA included Crocs, the U.S. Army, Unilever, and Hennessy Cognac.

"This is an undeniably important time for the marketing communications industry to reshape its approach to creative thinking and execution," said Lor Gold. "Old, bogged-down models are slightly out of touch with the realities that our clients face daily. I am committed to lead our global creative talent and determined to inspire the creative leadership team to exceed our clients' expectations. With Schawk continuing to expand and develop its strategic and creative offerings, we will be positioned to optimize the evolving channel mix for our clients' brands through the unique brand development and deployment offering at Schawk."

In the role of global chief creative officer, Gold will develop a global portfolio of work that seeks to be highly strategic, brand appropriate, tactically optimized and which utilizes proven online/offline techniques for generating highly effective work across all channels to provide opportunities for true return on investment for Schawk's clients. In addition to inspiring and leading the Company's creative teams, Gold will also focus on developing creative tools and processes in collaboration with the Company's chief strategy officer to provide the greatest synergy in its creative and strategic offerings.

"Lor brings passion, creative leadership and a wealth of strategic marketing experience to Schawk," said Eric Ashworth, chief strategy officer at Schawk. "His pedigree and experience allows us to further develop our existing offering while also bringing the value of new skill sets to our portfolio of clients."