“We Strive for Great at Every Swing”: D3’s Limitless Creative Ecosystem

For Isaac Pagán Muñoz, creativity is a language—one he's fluent in, even if he’d probably never admit that. Isaac is the kind of person to uplift the team around him before taking any credit himself.

As executive creative director at PepsiCo Foods US’ in-house agency, D3, Isaac oversees a team of over 30 creatives to drive cross-platform work for PepsiCo’s vast array of food brands. He came into the role in September 2023 after spending years learning the language of creativity at agencies including BBDO, Leo Burnett and Ogilvy, as well as Facebook’s Creative Shop.

Isaac believes that “the trajectory of one's life and career takes the turns that it's meant to at the right times,” a perspective that encapsulates his career journey so far. He became an “expert in the food and beverage space” after working most recently with brands like Tyson Foods, Constellation Brands and Absolut, not as part of a grand plan, but through immersion in Chicago’s high-calibre F&B creative scene. It was there that he evolved as both a creative and a leader.

Ultimately, he reflects, “it grew me into the kind of creative that was needed here.”
‘Here’ in this instance means D3, with its “large portfolio of iconic brands” proving the biggest draw for Isaac as he geared up to join the agency in September 2023. Wrapped up in an overarching sense of creative ambition, to him D3 was “like working at one of the best agencies, because they have some of the best clients–all of these brands–in one place.”

Decoding In-House Agility

His decision to join was also fuelled by a natural curiosity towards how in-house agencies operate at the rate and pace that they do.

It’s a question many creatives ponder: “How does an internal agency take advantage of being on the inside? How can they move? How can they move faster? How can they do better work? How can they shortcut certain things that external agencies can't, but still do that at the creative calibre of external agencies, and do the kind of work that external agencies would want to be making?”

When Isaac looked at D3, he saw those possibilities already in motion. “I saw the potential, and it continued to happen and get better and better.”

Now immersed within D3’s creative ecosystem, Isaac has gotten to grips with the pace and agility that the agency operates at day to day. “The last year was a real whirlwind,” he says.“I don’t think I’ve produced as much work, or seen as much work produced in my career.”

Isaac’s belief in the creative language stands firmly as the driving force behind everything he does at D3, regardless of what brand or platform he’s working on. Heading up a team of over 30 who are working on numerous projects at any given time, his time is split between creative direction, strategic planning and higher-level business affairs.

“The thing that I love the most, and that if I could get away with it, I would spend all my day doing, is spending time with the teams, reviewing creative, talking creativity, speaking the creative language and making the work stronger.

“My day to day, typically, is 20% to 30% of that. The rest is staying aware and immersed in the business and running the day-to-day communications, making sure that people know what's happening at the right time, and managing upwards as well, which is a big part of the role.”

Steering the Creative Ship

Isaac’s approach to leadership is a balance between sharing a consistent cadence of business insights, and leveraging the expertise of the five creative leads who drive and sit close to the different brands in the portfolio. “It's me steering the broad strokes and setting the stage strategically based on broader business knowledge and then giving my teams the agency and the space as the true experts in each of the briefs to operate, so it becomes more like stage setting, and then they share ideas, and we craft the ideas based on that.”

D3 has also recently launched its own internal strategic department, an invaluable tool to help it understand its consumers on a deeper, more granular level. It helps Isaac and his team to stay “plugged into the brands and the audiences that we serve.” He adds, “Now we have a muscle built in house where we can really dig into consumer behaviours and mine for really powerful and interesting human insights that are unique to our brands.”

Leadership, to Isaac, is “ever-evolving”. He considers himself a student of the craft, always learning in service of both the team and the work. “I think a big part in my view of being a ‘good leader’ is having the humility to continue to learn and continue to get better, in service of the team and the work.” He keeps himself immersed within the creative process, which he confesses could be slightly ‘selfish’, as that’s the part of the job that he loves the most, but in doing so it also enables him to forge close working relationships with the team around him.

His leadership philosophy centres around a simple mantra: ‘Mind the people, mind the work.’

“It’s making sure that people feel like they are cared for, because they really are and it’s not just lip service. Look after them, and that goes from providing strong, strategic guidance which then allows them to do the best work, sell it and get it all the way through and have it be successful, but also, at a personal level, that they feel like someone has their back and that they're working in a true team environment where everyone wants to see everyone succeed.”

He leads a creative team that is fuelled by optimism and positivity. Recently, Isaac shared a post from Sir John Hegarty on LinkedIn, which said ‘creativity is about positivity’. Isaac echoed this sentiment, writing, “I share the same belief. Creativity is an act of optimism. The conviction that something can be made better, and the willingness to make it so.” It’s a common thread of my conversation with Isaac and apparent in the way that he speaks about his work.

“Whatever kind of creative you are, you have to be optimistic. It is an act of hope. You have to have that optimistic energy inside of you to say, ‘Oh, I'm going to go and create something that doesn't exist.’ It's a bold thing to think that you can do that.”

Above, 'Oh Lay's' for Lay's, starring Messi

D3’s Expanding Horizons

D3’s work is intimately linked to the wider business goals and ambitions of PepsiCo and its associated brands. This connection helps to drive D3’s optimistic spirit forward, as everyone involved in creating the work is working towards shared overarching goals and ambitions. “We are accountable for the impact, just like the brand managers are. We see the end game,” he says.

Determined to solve business problems with creative solutions, D3’s capabilities go beyond traditional TVC campaigns–although they work on plenty, Super Bowl ads included–and expand into the realm of product launches and branded partnerships. Isaac specifically shouts out D3’s concepting and partnerships team, who find ways to incorporate well-loved brands into mainstream media, such as TV shows, crossing the bridge between advertising and entertainment.

”You can walk across the hall to the team that manages a brand and say, ‘hey, what if we partner your brand with this show, and we can actually partner with a director of that show to create something special for the brand within the show’. Then it becomes a story, and then it becomes a creative output that you would not arrive at if you were given a brief for it.”

One recent example? Sending Doritos into space. Yes, really. It’s just one example of the close cross-collaboration between the agency and the brand teams. In this instance, this program involved creating an entirely new product that aligned with food safety codes and regulations, and sending it out into the universe. “If a creative tells you that one of their dreams is not to send something to space, they're lying!” Isaac laughs.

Above, Doritos Cool Ranch Zero Gravity chips

For him, the joy of the job remains rooted in the act of making. “I come into work energised and happy and excited, and I always say I don't have to be here. I get to be here, and it is a privilege.

”The work that I do in my career, that's the fuel, that's the money in the bank for me. If I'm producing good to great work consistently, I'm happy. Everything else can be falling apart, and I'm happy because that's the creative spirit.

“I never would claim, or think of myself as a great creative but I do love creativity.I love the process of making and the output of making.I love seeing things not exist, and then suddenly exist, and then suddenly they're out in the world."

D3’s ambition shows no signs of slowing, and as Isaac puts it: “We strive for great at every swing.”

And with every swing, they just keep hitting harder.