How Tara DeVeaux, CEO of Burrell and BCG Worldwide, Harnesses Culture as a Growth Strategy

But brands must earn their way into the conversation

“Our job isn’t to insert brands into culture,” says Tara DeVeaux, CEO of BCG Worldwide and Burrell Communications. “It’s to identify the people and ideas already moving culture and help brands earn the right to participate.”

The agency’s new work for app-based mobile phone service TextNow—starring Kat Williams and with a Nipsey Hussle soundtrack—typifies that approach.

“TextNow’s promise is simple: your phone service should adapt to you, not trap you with hidden fees and contracts,” DeVeaux tells Muse. “Katt Williams has spent his career giving voice to people who feel like the system is stacked against them. That alignment wasn’t a creative device. It was the strategy.”

Play

We spent a few minutes with Tara to learn more about her background, her creative inspirations and recent work she’s admired.

MUSE: Where did you grow up, where do you live now and how do the two compare?

Tara Deveaux: I’m from New York. I was born in the Bronx, went to school on Long Island and Brooklyn is home. It’s where community, family (blood and adopted), resilience and culture were part of my everyday life. Eight years ago, I moved to Los Angeles but I spend 50 percent of my time on planes now. The pace is different, but the common thread between my former and current life is possibility. Brooklyn taught me to hustle. Los Angeles constantly forces me to imagine what’s next.

Was there an “a-ha” moment in your life that made you realize what you wanted to do?

I grew up wanting to be Oprah. By the time I went to high school, I shifted to acting. But in my freshman year of college, I realized I would need a job that paid the bills so I took a bunch of tests that asked me about my interests, and they all said advertising. I needed to pick a major, so that was it. But I stuck with it because I liked being surrounded by creatively curious people. And I had a knack for architecting the environments that enabled them to thrive and sometimes do the best work of their careers. I experienced that for the first time at Oxygen Media, but really turned it into a practice at BBDO. I am working hard to create that kind of culture at BCG Worldwide.

What’s a creative hill you’d die on?

AI is overrated. Does it help you get to great sooner? YES. Does it streamline workflows and take many low vibrational hours out of the day? NO DOUBT. Does it help organize information, test ideas, speed up execution? OF COURSE! But breakthrough campaigns come from lived experiences, contradictions, and all of the irrational parts of being human. AI is a remarkable tool. It just shouldn’t become the author. (Note: This answer was written by an LLM with human interference).

What’s a source of inspiration you return to constantly?

My kid-ults. They’re 23, 24 and 28, and they’ve become some of my favorite teachers. They challenge my assumptions, introduce me to new ideas, focus-group new work and remind me that every generation sees the world through a different lens. They keep me curious. They keep me humble. That’s been invaluable to me.

A non-advertising industry you learn from?

Entertainment. The best storytellers in entertainment understand how to build worlds fans want to participate in. They create anticipation, emotional connection and keep fans coming back. Brands spend too much time thinking about individual campaigns and not enough time thinking about how to weave those efforts into one cohesive world people want to keep coming back to.

Tell us about a recent project you’re proud of.

The TextNow campaign with Katt Williams. It captures the evolution of Burrell into the Subcultural Agency within BCG Worldwide. When the brand truth and the cultural truth reinforce each other, the work doesn’t just get attention. It builds trust and drives business results. That connection between finding the right people who can unlock growth is what we’re building across BCG Worldwide every day.

What’s overrated in marketing right now?

Chasing trends. Too many brands are trying to win the algorithm instead of winning with people. A trending moment might get attention, but a meaningful purpose builds a business. I’d rather understand what people value than what they happen to ♥️ on any given day.

Was there a mentor who helped you navigate the industry?

BBDO. Crazy answer, but stepping into BBDO N.Y. in 2007 literally changed my whole approach to this business. Ozzy [former CEO John Osborn] taught me that doing well is meaningless if you’re not also doing good. Mark Goldstein taught me how to be a shark and kind at the same time. Greg Hahn scared the shit out of me in our first meeting, but taught me how to judge and be a champion for the work. And Lubars taught me how to be a leader that uses their team—a leader of leaders.

Now, it’s not lost on me that I’m a Black woman, running Burrell, the most well-known Black-owned agency in the business, and my answer is four white men in a general-market agency. But without BBDO, I never would have had the guts or the vision to embark on the transformation of this legacy agency, to stand 10 toes down on the principle that understanding the people driving culture is the only way to unlock mass demand. And because of the almost 10 years I spent there I never lose sight of why the work we do matters.

P.S. A huge shout out to Tracy Lovatt, Charise Mita and Liz Boothby—future Strategy Hall of Famers who were my own personal and professional “True North” during my BBDO tenure.

What would you be doing if you weren’t in advertising?

I’d probably be doing something in the wellness space, helping people live longer, healthier, more active lives. I’m fascinated by the intersection of culture, community, behavior and health, especially among cohorts that have been underserved for far too long.

You’ve got 2 minutes with the industry. What’s your hot take?

It’s time to retire “multicultural marketing.” The people shaping culture today are the ones driving brand demand. Understanding them isn’t a specialty. It’s the job. The agencies and brands that continue treating cultural intelligence as an add-on instead of a core business capability are going to find themselves increasingly disconnected from where growth actually comes from.

Culture isn’t a marketing strategy. It’s a growth strategy.