Tom Townsend

Rodgers Townsend was founded in 1996, when my partner, Tim Rodgers, and I left D'Arcy Masius Benton & Bowles, the St. Louis office of one of the largest firms in the world at the time. In 2006, Rodgers Townsend was acquired by DDB/Omnicom. Prior to Rodgers Townsend, I spent ten years at DMB&B/St. Louis, most recently as Senior Vice President/Group Creative Director, where I worked on M&M/Mars – Milky Way, Twix, Skittles, and Combos snacks, Anhueser-Busch beers, Blockbuster, Southwestern Bell, and other major brands. I have received industry honors through awards from the National Addy Awards, The One Show, Communication Arts, the Daytime Emmy Awards (shared with Ben Bohling and Nathaniel Bull), Archive, Print, Graphis, and Cannes. Prior to DMB&B, I was a Creative Director of Gardner Advertising owned by Wells, Rich and Greene. There my accounts included Ralston Purina and Southwestern Bell. Prior to Gardner, I was at Stolz Advertising in St. Louis, where I worked on McDonald's and other regional accounts. With Tim Rodgers, I have shared the Ernst and Young Entrepreneur of the Year Award; I am a 2014 inductee into the St. Louis Media Hall of Fame, and have received an honorary Doctor of Letters from Savannah College of Art and Design. Early in my career I was honored as one of "40 Under 40" people to watch in St. Louis. I studied jazz piano with Mary Lou Williams, I have played piano with Chuck Berry, and BB King once loaned me 100 dollars. I paid him back in Japanese yen. Upon the loss of my oldest son in 2010, I started the Alex Townsend Memorial Foundation to support music and art initiatives. The two major projects of the Foundation are the A-Town Get Down Music and Art Festival in Savannah, GA, and Pianos for People, where we give acoustic pianos to underprivileged families. I also write a blog regarding my experience with loss at iwillfindbeauty.com, and Facebook/iwillfindbeauty.com.