TOYGAR BAZARKAYA

Toygar is the founder and Chief Creative Officer of RECE, an independent creative company built for leaders who believe that speed, cultural relevance, and deep audience understanding are essential to their brand’s future growth. Specializing in growth audiences, RECE strategically builds Creative Excellence on a foundation of Radical Empathy to unlock transformative results.

Born in Turkey, raised in Germany, and based in New York, Toygar has led creative transformation on multiple continents. At BBDO Germany, he helped make it the most awarded German network in Cannes in 2008. At BBDO New York, he led iconic brands including Visa, Gillette, Campbell’s, HP, The American Red Cross, and Major League Baseball.

In 2015, he joined Havas as CCO for the Americas, working at the intersection of media, data analytics, and AI alongside the IBM Watson team. His belief in cross-disciplinary collaboration led him to become CCO of We Are Unlimited—a bespoke DDB/Omnicom agency uniting all disciplines under one roof and one leadership, built to deliver creative excellence across all touch points for McDonald’s.

In 2019, he became Partner and Chief Creative Officer at Optimist, named Campaign’s Brand Experience Agency of the Year in 2020. There, he pushed boundaries across digital, virtual, and physical brand expressions in both the US and Europe. Later, as CCO at 22Squared, he led creative at one of the largest independent employee-owned agencies in the U.S.

Toygar has won 31 Cannes Lions for 15 brands across 12 categories—a testament to his belief: “If you’re going to do it, make it great. It’s more fun and more effective.”

He’s judged and chaired juries at Cannes Lions, D&AD, LIA, and Clio Awards, and has been named to Adweek’s Creative 100 and Campaign’s Digital 40 over 40. But most importantly, he still believes the best is yet to come.