Nick Ciffone on Being Part of a Team That’s Running Fast to the Finish Line

TBWA\Media Arts Lab (MAL), Apple’s bespoke global creative agency, recently announced the promotion of Emmy-award winning creative director Nick Ciffone to ECD. 

Nick has spent eight years at MAL after joining in 2017; first as creative director, and then as group creative director. In this time, Apple continued to embed itself further into culture and people’s everyday lives, with advertising campaigns that harness the power of humour, wit, and relatability helping the brand authentically connect with audiences and customers around the world. 

Instrumental in cementing Apple’s reputation as creative storytellers, Nick led the teams on the Emmy award winning 2024 holiday campaign, ‘Fuzzy Feelings’, and Emmy-nominated Apple TV+ campaigns ‘Call Me’ with Timothée Chalamet (2023) and ‘Everyone but Jon Hamm’ (2022). 

Now taking on the role of ECD, Nick credits the leadership of global chief creative officer Brent Anderson in making the stars align between Apple and MAL, ensuring that everyone is racing towards the same, ambitiously creative finish line. To learn more about his journey so far, LBB’s Abi Lightfoot caught up with him. 

LBB> Congratulations on your new role! What most excites you about your new position, and how do you hope to continue building on an already established reputation of great creative work?

Nick> Thank you. I'm blushing. I think more than half of the work of making great work happens before you start thinking of ideas. You need the right creatives, the right brand, the right decision maker, the right ambition, the right budget, the right moment, the right taste, the list goes on. This can often take years to align. To be clear, I’m quite literally talking about the partnership that Brent Anderson [global chief creative officer] has fostered between MAL and Apple over the last eight years. It feels like we start every brief halfway to the finish line because we have sweated the process, we can spend our time crafting the work. So in short – big lead, run fast.

LBB> As an ECD, your role is likely more going to be about leadership and guiding the creative product versus being right in the weeds all the time. What are your thoughts on that? And how do you approach that aspect?

Nick> I think the project determines the role I play more than the title. Sometimes it’s a massive opportunity with a large team and I can rely on how talented everyone is, choosing moments to help push here and there. And sometimes it’s a small team and we're all in a writer's room just trying to make each other laugh. Either way, I hope it feels less like weeds and more like flowers...

Above, 'Call Me' with Timothée Chalamet (2023)

LBB> Looking back, did you always envision yourself as creative, and did you expect your career to follow the path that it has?

Nick> I'm pretty sure I wanted to be a stuntman. But, the runner up was definitely a copywriter. Of which I had no actual clue what the job really was, or where it would take me. 

LBB> You said that creating work that impacts culture is the “sole expectation” of working at MAL. How do you keep yourself connected to culture and able to create work that generates real, meaningful impact – especially when you are hyper-focused on a brand such as Apple?

Nick> I read books. I watch TV. I listen to music. I internet. But mostly, I surround myself with people that are far more interesting than me, and I do my best to listen to them.

LBB> You’ve worked on some culturally-defining campaigns over your last eight years at MAL, are there any pieces of work that stand out to you as making a particular impact on your career? Or do you have a favourite?

Nick> I have favourites. I’ve picked them primarily because of the people that made them. There was a spot back in 2018 directed by Daniel Kwan (of The Daniels) called ‘Fly Market’. It was a great spot, but more than the spot I learned so much from Daniel about preparation and trusting your crew. Similarly, working on ‘Fuzzy Feelings’ with Lucia Aniello, I felt like we made a great little film, but even more I got to sit front row to a master class in performance coaching. 

So many other great ones, and I know the right answer is I can't pick favourite’s... but I guess I'm just a bad dad. 

Above, 'Fuzzy Feelings' (2024)