Peter Defries and Alan Wilson return to Australia to join Special

International creative duo Peter Defries and Alan Wilson are returning to Australia after a decade in New York, joining Special Group to round out its regional leadership team for one of its biggest creative accounts.

The pair join the independent agency as regional group creative directors for the Uber and Uber Eats accounts, which Special has held since 2017.

Defries and Wilson most recently worked as executive creative directors at BBH New York, where they lead the J.M. Smucker Company business — which owns some of America’s leading FMCG brands including Jif, Twinkies, Dunkin, and more — plus major accounts like Walmart and Cadillac.

Wilson said the pair have been “massive fans” of Special for a long time.

“Watching from the other side of the world, we were consistently blown away by the breakthrough work they produced, especially with Uber and Uber Eats. So when the opportunity arose to be part of it, we couldn’t say no,” he said in a media release on Wednesday.

While leaving New York was not a decision the pair took lightly, according to Defries, the chance to come home and join “this extremely talented team” was too good to pass up. He said Special “push[es] creative boundaries at a world-class level” like nobody else.

Tom Martin, Special’s partner and CCO, said in the release: “We’re pumped to have Pete and Alan boomerang back to Australia and back into Special. We’re at our best when we bring together top-tier humans who get what it takes to make great work and do it with care, craft and real collaboration.”

Defries and Wilson round out the agency’s regional Uber leadership team, alongside managing director Lauren Portelli, and executive strategy director, Celia Garforth,

Under Portelli and Garforth’s leadership, the partnership has grown to extend across ANZ, Japan, South Korea, Hong Kong, and Taiwan. It is all serviced from Special’s Sydney office.

(L-R): Peter Defries, Celia Garforth, Lauren Portelli, Alan Wilson

“Celia and Lauren have been instrumental in building our creative reputation across APAC. And now, with Peter and Alan joining them, we believe we have one of the best, most exciting teams in the world,” Cade Heyde, global partner of Special, said in the release.

Special is not the only agency servicing Uber that has made some leadership appointments recently.

EssenceMediacom, who holds the media account, appointed Maddison Keogh as its new APAC client manager partner last week. She takes on the role to lead the Uber account, with billings understood to be worth AU$235 million.

Last year, EssenceMediacom was reappointed by Uber, and it is understood the account is entirely run from the agency’s Sydney headquarters. The Australian Mediacom team, prior to its merger with Essence, was first appointed to the account in 2017.

Currently, Uber is also engaging Hello (formerly Hello Social) for social media marketing.

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Lauren McNamara

Lauren McNamara was the associate editor at Mumbrella. She joined in November 2022 as editorial assistant, after completing a Bachelor of Communications (Journalism) at UTS. She left Mumbrella in August 2025.

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topics Alan Wilson Cade Heyde celia garforth creative Lauren Portelli Peter Defries special Special Group Tom Martin Uber Uber Eats

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