Retail Brand & Creative Strategy

Citi • New York, NY

4d • $163,600 - $245,400 • Onsite

About The Position

The SVP – Retail Brand, Creative & Experiential Strategy (C14) is a pivotal role designed for a creative brand superstar with impeccable taste, refined craft, and an uncompromising standard of excellence. Reporting directly to the Director (C15) of Retail Marketing Strategy & Market Activation, you will serve as the central Creative Subject Matter Expert (SME) and brand authority across Retail Banking & Citigold Marketing. In this role, you will have the canvas, budget, and executive backing to challenge conventional category tropes and define how Citi shows up across consumer journeys / touchpoints. You will direct end-to-end creative platform activation, coach teams and agencies on authoring inspiring briefs, partner seamlessly with the Citi Wealth & enterprise brand teams and top-tier global agencies, and weave brand storytelling across physical and digital ecosystems. We are seeking a seasoned creative leader and brand builder—with significant pedigree in leading advertising/creative agencies and world-class consumer brands—who possesses a discerning, critical eye for creative excellence, the gravitas to defend bold ideas, and the passion to make consumers genuinely reappraise and choose Citi.

Requirements

• Bachelor’s degree in Marketing, Advertising, Fine Arts, Communications, Design, or related field; Master’s/advanced degree or top portfolio school background a strong plus.
• 10–12+ years of progressive brand, creative, and advertising leadership experience.
• Significant experience within a leading creative/advertising agency (as a Creative Director, Group Creative Director, or Senior Creative Strategist) and/or a world-class client-side brand management organization recognized for creative excellence, storytelling, and cultural impact.
• Exceptional portfolio demonstrating mastery in launching multi-channel brand campaigns, breakthrough experiential activations, and high-impact visual design systems.
• Proven ability to author and coach teams on writing world-class creative briefs, dissect creative concepts, articulate actionable creative direction, and oversee complex productions.
• Strong familiarity with modern digital media ecosystems, programmatic creative best practices, paid social content strategy, and performance-informed creative optimization.
• High aesthetic standards, refined taste, and an instinct for separating good work from truly exceptional, culture-shaping ideas.
• Gravitas and executive presence (C14 level) to present creative work persuasively to senior leadership, challenge conventional thinking constructively, and defend bold, breakthrough ideas.
• Outstanding interpersonal skills with the ability to bridge creative, strategic, analytical, media, and legal/compliance partners into a harmonious, high-performing workflow.

Nice To Haves

• Master’s/advanced degree or top portfolio school background

Responsibilities

• Serve as the central creative authority across all US Retail businesses, executing on creative guidelines, visual standards, and brand tone-of-voice to elevate Citi’s presence far above standard banking conventions.
• Champion uncompromising design craft across every consumer touchpoint, ensuring brand identity, creative direction, and messaging architectures are executed with immaculate precision, modern elegance, and consistency.
• Institute rigorous creative review rituals; evaluate concepts with a sharp, discerning eye to ensure every output is not merely compliant, but strategically resonant, emotionally compelling, culturally relevant, and executed at the highest craft level.
• Direct the activation and localization of the retail creative platforms, translating Retail Banking & Citigold strategic objectives, segment nuances, and core market-building initiatives into imaginative, full-funnel creative platforms.
• Conceive and champion high-impact campaign concepts, and brand narratives that spark organic conversation, capture consumer mindshare, and drive measurable brand reappraisal and consideration.
• Pioneer fresh content formats, video storytelling, and digital-first narratives tailored to distinct consumer and wealth segments across their financial lifecycles.
• Coach and elevate the entire Retail Banking & Citigold marketing team on the authorship of inspiring, razor-sharp creative briefs that crystallize strategic challenges, unlock fresh consumer truths, and inspire world-class work from creative partners.
• Partner closely with the Citi Wealth & enterprise brand team, top-tier external creative, brand, digital, and production agencies. Act as a demanding yet inspiring client partner who challenges agency leadership to produce their most ambitious, award-caliber work.
• Develop and deploy end-to-end brand, creative, and experiential strategies that seamlessly interconnect physical retail environments (branch merchandising and environmental branding) with digital, social, and in-person activation channels.
• Partner with branch design and merchandising leads to ensure in-branch digital displays, window takeovers, and point-of-sale collateral match above-the-line (ATL) campaign excellence.
• Partner closely with dedicated internal media strategy teams and external media agencies to ensure creative assets are tailored for channel-specific best practices, audience micro-segments, and distribution algorithms.
• Regularly review creative performance metrics, brand lift studies, and attribution data alongside analytics partners to continuously test, learn, and optimize creative iterations in-market.
• Appropriately assess risk when business decisions are made, demonstrating particular consideration for the firm's reputation and safeguarding Citigroup, its clients and assets, by driving compliance with applicable laws, rules and regulations, adhering to Policy, applying sound ethical judgment regarding personal behavior, conduct and business practices, and escalating, managing and reporting control issues with transparency.

Benefits

• medical, dental & vision coverage
• 401(k)
• life, accident, and disability insurance
• wellness programs
• paid time off packages, including planned time off (vacation), unplanned time off (sick leave), and paid holidays

What This Job Offers

• Job Type: Full-time
• Career Level: Director