In-House Production at VaynerX Is Different, Says Eva Nosidam President

​Andrea Ogunbadejo always wanted to be a producer, though it was music production that first caught her attention. But by 17 years old, she had switched schools to pursue film and media, embarking on a career that has seen her produce everything from British indie films to commercials.

Having begun her career at VaynerMedia in London, Andrea made a name for herself in the North American production community, working in Toronto and New York. She now calls the latter home for the second time, after re-joining the VaynerX family as president of in-house production studio Eva Nosidam at the start of 2025.

Inspired early on by Hollywood producer Julia Phillips’ memoir ‘You'll Never Eat Lunch in This Town Again’, Andrea’s career has since been shaped by a journey to carve out her own distinct approach to producing and leadership – one that embraces her natural introvertedness and ability to read people.

“I'm not a shark,” Andrea says plainly. “I'm not someone who can go into a room and start yelling.”

Instead, she’s drawn to a quieter kind of power – one based on empathy and intuition.“A lot of being a producer is anticipating needs. There is another way of doing it, which is telling people what they need – ‘the Julia Phillips way’ – but for me, it was more like ‘I'm sensing this is something you need or want’, and being a connector.”

Andrea now approaches leadership in this same way, finding middle ground between people and understanding the needs of both talent and the business. Without raising her voice, Andrea has relied on the power of passion to be heard.

“I’ve found that’s always been the thing that’s propelled me in my career; it's quite hard to deny that passion and that care. It's an infectious energy. I've built my career by being someone that people want to work with. You can do it by fear and aggression, and you'll probably get stuff done. But at what cost – to myself and other people? I want to bring people together, but it's always a balance.”

^{Above: Opendoor 'Move Like a Pro' (prod. Eva Nosidam)}

Prior to rejoining the VaynerX family, Andrea led production at Magic Circle Workshop, producing not only in-house projects for the Cossette network of agencies in Canada, but directly for clients too. This gave her experience in an integrated studio environment, expanding a diverse résumé already decorated with tenures at independent studios, agencies and freelance roles.

Combined with her affinity for Vayner’s “anything is possible” energy, fast pace, a variety of world-leading clients, and an opportunity to work closely with founder Gary Vaynerchuk, Andrea’s January return to the network seemed a natural next step.

“Coming back to the fold, leading Eva Nosidam, has taken a lot of the foundations that I learned at Vayner [in London], but also my other experiences,” she says. “It felt like the right combination, the right time, and an opportunity to bring something different while having that basis of the VaynerX way of doing things.”

According to Andrea, it’s an exciting moment to take the reins, as lines become increasingly blurred between film, TV, social media and advertising – with production playing a vital role in this matrix. “It's all content,” she explains. “At VaynerX, we want to make things that people want to watch, whether that's a TikTok ad or a Super Bowl spot or long-form, branded entertainment. That's a really interesting place for brands to play in… and production being a huge part of that is always exciting to me.”

However, with increasing pressure on production outfits to make more, faster, and under tighter budget constraints, Andrea and the Eva Nosidam team have plenty of challenges to overcome.

“Production can sometimes be tricky because there are some realities that are hard to bend. We work with many external partners and they have a way of doing things; the way a lot of our budgets are set up is based on industry standards we can't really change; there are lots of things to be mindful of, like health and safety. That fast-paced way of doing things can sometimes be at odds with production.

“But it's about setting those expectations, being really clear, getting as much done as you can upfront, trying to understand what those needs are, and then responding to them,” she adds.

“It’s always a dance, and it's always changing. But in production, we're all about responding to change and differences. So I always feel up for the challenge, and I know the rest of my team do as well.”

^{Above: Interstate Batteries - 'Mr Dependable'  (prod. Eva Nosidam)}

With the production space in flux perhaps more than ever, Andrea says Eva Nosidam, and the wider production community, has to react and evolve after following the same patterns and guidelines for a long time. This involves finding a new place alongside players old and new in the space, from other in-house studios at networks, agencies and brands, to the independent production companies.

“I love the production industry and I want it to flourish. I love working with partners, whether it's production companies, post houses, directors reps… I love my production community globally, and I want it to feel like a relationship where we're all figuring out how we can support each other, rather than an adversarial relationship.”

With the internal production company model ‘becoming more prevalent’ she says that it’s important to find new ways of working with these external partners. “There's always going to be that opportunity. So it's about whether or not we collectively want to take it and want to be a little bit different and experimental, or we don't.

“I love the community,” she adds, “and I always want to find ways to keep that because the talent is just insane out there. It would be remiss of me, wanting to make the best work that I can, to not tap into the best talent, so it's always an ongoing conversation. Things are shifting every three, six months, so we’re always responding to that. But I'm always open, and I always want to do what's best for the brands and the work.”

Being ‘as agile and inventive’ as possible, Andrea is keeping Eva Nosidam receptive to these changes. And for that, she says, communication is key. “It’s being more upstream and super tight with other leaders that have the same pressures. Being communicative and super open about what's happening. How can we start to anticipate needs?”

Looking ahead to the rest of 2025 and beyond, Andrea shares that the “ultimate goal” is to run “the best production studio in the best network in the world”. ‘The best’ can mean many things, but for her, the ambition is a simple two-pronged approach: “Delivering the thing that people want, and making things that work.”

And while Andrea feels keenly aware of the need to keep Eva Nosidam attuned to shifts across the industry – across other networks, production companies, post houses, or in film and TV – to avoid becoming “too myopic”, she notes that her goal is very specific to the needs and work of VaynerX.

“There's only one VaynerX,” she says. “Eva Nosidam being the flagship production studio within VaynerX means something specific. Brands come to VaynerX for a reason. So trying to figure out what that thing is is more important to me than trying to emulate what other people are doing. What they're doing is great, and it works for them, but what works for us is going to be different.”