End of an Era at Einson: Nichols becomes ceo as McElnea departs.

President Carl Nichols took on the ceo post at Einson Freeman last month, as long-time chief and 30-year company veteran Jeffrey McElnea departed the agency.

The stage for last month’s announcement was set in January 1999, when Einson parent WPP Group brought in Nichols to succeed McElnea as president and help drive growth. Founded in 1909, Paramus, NJ-based Einson Freeman is the oldest promotion agency in the U.S.

“We recruited Carl from Europe to come here and give us a whole new perspective, and that has come to bear,” says McElnea. “The business is very secure in his hands, so it’s certainly a good time for me to take a new opportunity.”

“We’ve started to make a number of changes in the past year,” says Nichols. Among those he cites are last year’s launch of industry-specific EinsonHealth, an alliance with WPP sister unit CommonHealth, and more recent business agreements with Boston-based online marketer One21 Interactive and St. Louis event shop Javelin, Inc. (The latter two involve joint pitches on business and revenue sharing.)

Nichols also wants the agency to return more forcefully to its P-O-P roots, an area he says has been neglected in recent years. To that end, Einson recently hired Don Brennan as group director. Brennan spent 25 years at Glover Advertising & Displays, a company he helped found. He most recently was vp-marketing and advertising for Neumann Sports Glove Co., Hoboken, NJ.

McElnea will become president of Satmark Sales Co., a start-up that will seek to establish global ATM networks. He is proud that Einson “reinforced the importance of promotion as a discipline” and “created some of the important tactics that are used today as standard fare.”

“It’s been a great ride. Some days you’re driving, and some days you’re riding,” he says.

Einson Freeman ranks 11th on the 2000 promo 100 with $32.8 million in net revenues and two-year growth of 61 percent. The increase was fueled by last year’s acquisition of international sports management and event marketing company Prism Group, which works primarily with Ford Motor Co.