Jessica Buch Joins GREY Germany as Head of Strategy
On October 1, 2023, Jessica Buch will start as head of strategy in the management team of GREY Germany. She is responsible for the strategic consulting of clients across all locations as well as for the alignment and expansion of the strategy unit. In doing so, she is in direct exchange with GREY's global strategy network and the German management team Francisca Maass (president and CCO), Stefan Steinrode (CFO) and Natalie Martens (MD). Buch joins GREY from Jung von Matt, where she was most recently strategy director and head of a brand, campaign and business strategy team responsible for campaigns and brand positioning in the FMCG, beauty and lifestyle, food and automotive sectors.
Buch started her career as a strategist at Jung von Matt back in 2017 during her master's degree in business psychology at the Fresenius University of Applied Sciences in Berlin. Over the past six years, she took on increasing responsibility for the development of sustainable brand and campaign strategies and their implementation for a variety of clients such as Beiersdorf, Douglas, MAN and Zalando. Across the board, she was involved in the strategic development of the Jung von Matt agency group as well as in new business acquisition. The management and sparring of project teams in the areas of brand and creative strategy, corporate strategy and employer branding were part of her responsibilities.
Even in her leadership role at GREY Germany, Buch continues to be a lecturer at the Fresenius University of Applied Sciences in Hamburg and supervises master's theses in business psychology and research methods. She herself participated in the Jung von Matt Female Mentoring Program and the ADC's Future Female Seminar.
The move to the GREY Germany team is a well-considered step for Buch towards more leadership and decision-making opportunities and new areas of responsibility: "The international network of GREY Studios in various countries and the international client and group structure promise new challenges. I still love project business and acquiring new customers. But I am especially looking forward to advising and supporting GREY's clients in the long term. And I’m happy to join the GREY team, which has transformed very successfully in recent years and holds exciting prospects."
GREY Germany has realigned itself as the creative studio of the GREY Group since the beginning of 2019 and attaches great importance to creative ideas and implementations being based on brand strategy decisions. As agency and creative managing director, Maass is very pleased about the new partner in the management team: "Creation without strategy is just as unthinkable for us as strategy without creation. Jessica has mastered the entire claviature of strategic and at the same time creative thinking and is also a wonderfully inspiring personality for our team and our clients. She embodies with heart and soul our claim to offer surprising, professionally and effective creation. We are overjoyed that she has chosen us."
Buch takes over as head of strategy at GREY Germany from Anja Schüling, who is leaving the agency at her own request. "Anja wants to go new ways professionally and for this we wish her the very best. We part on the best of terms and thank her for her expertise and the time we spent together," Maass comments on Schüling's decision.
GREY Germany currently employs almost 150 people, equally divided between the Hamburg and Düsseldorf offices. Buch will lead an initial five-person strategy team in both cities from October and will be supported by Laura Combuechen, who has already been on board at GREY as Strategy Director since the end of 2019.
