Creative Lead - Experiential in Reading

Senior Experiential Lead – FMCG Drinks

Location: Berkshire / Hybrid

Salary: Up to £70,000–£80,000 depending on experience

The Opportunity

I’m working on a genuinely exciting opportunity for a senior experiential creative/Associate Creative Director to join a leading brand experience agency and help shape some of the most ambitious work across the FMCG drinks space.

This isn't a traditional Creative Director role — we're looking for someone who is obsessed with experiential and has bags of experience doing it.

Someone who can take a familiar drinks brand and ask:

“How do we completely disrupt this?”

How do we turn a brand into something people can step inside, interact with, photograph, share and talk about?

How do we create a moment that doesn't just communicate a campaign, but brings the brand to life in a completely unexpected way?

We're looking for a highly conceptual thinker who can move effortlessly from a cultural insight to a huge experiential idea — and then bring that idea to life through physical, digital, social, retail and live experiences.

This role is all about drinks!! You will need the vast majority of your portfolio to be drinks FMCG brands.

We are specifically looking for someone with strong FMCG beverage experience who is already working within experiential, brand experience, activation or creative production.

You will need to understand the drinks world — its brands, consumers, culture and competitive landscape — and know how to create experiences that make people feel something about a brand.

Whether that's a completely immersive brand world, a theatrical live experience, a disruptive activation, a cultural moment, a retail takeover or something nobody has thought of before, you'll be responsible for turning brands into experiences people remember.

Who We're Looking For

We're looking for someone operating at Senior Designer, Creative Lead, Associate Creative Director or equivalent level within an experiential agency.

You should already be creating experiential work and have at least 3–5 years' experience working in a senior creative position, with a strong agency background behind you.

Most importantly, you're a conceptual creative first.

You don't just make things look good. You think about why they should exist, what they should make people feel and why people would actually want to engage with them.

You understand that the best experiential work isn't simply a nice installation or a beautifully designed space.

It's an idea.

An idea that earns attention.

An idea that creates conversation.

An idea that makes a brand impossible to ignore.

What You'll Be Doing

• Develop big, disruptive experiential concepts for some of the world's most exciting FMCG drinks brands.
• Turn brand challenges, cultural insights and consumer behaviours into ideas that people genuinely want to experience.
• Develop theatrical, immersive and unexpected ways to bring brands to life.
• Push beyond conventional activations and challenge clients to think bigger.
• Create ideas that can live across experiential, live, social, digital, retail, content and culture.
• Work closely with strategy to find the insight or cultural tension that unlocks the idea.
• Take a concept from the initial spark through to a fully realised creative proposition.
• Build compelling creative narratives and presentations that make clients see the idea, feel the idea and want to buy the idea.
• Use AI, 3D, visualisation and emerging creative tools to bring concepts to life and make pitches genuinely compelling.
• Present confidently to senior clients and sell ambitious creative thinking.
• Collaborate with designers, strategists, producers and wider creative teams to turn ambitious ideas into reality.
• Mentor and inspire other creatives, helping raise the creative bar across the agency.
• Work closely with senior creative and client teams to develop long-term relationships and unlock bigger opportunities.

The Creative Profile

We're looking for someone who is has been in a senior role no longer than 3 years.

Conceptual. You can start with a blank piece of paper and find the big idea.

Experiential. You understand that an experience needs to be felt, not just seen.

Brave. You're comfortable challenging the brief and pushing clients somewhere they haven't been before.

Culturally switched-on. You know what's happening in music, sport, fashion, food, nightlife, social and popular culture — and understand how brands can genuinely participate in it.

Commercial. You know that brilliant creative still needs to solve a business problem.

A storyteller. You can make a room believe in an idea.

Obsessed with brands. Particularly FMCG drinks brands and the culture surrounding them.

Essential Experience

• 3–5+ years in a senior creative position within an experiential, brand experience or activation agency.
• Strong FMCG drinks / beverage experience is essential.
• A proven track record of creating experiential and brand experience campaigns.
• A portfolio demonstrating genuinely conceptual, culturally relevant and disruptive creative thinking.
• Experience taking ideas from initial concept through to execution.
• Strong understanding of live, experiential, social and physical brand experiences.
• Exceptional creative presentation and storytelling skills.
• Experience using AI, 3D and visualisation tools to sell and develop creative ideas.
• Ability to work collaboratively with strategy, production, design and client teams.
• The confidence and maturity to operate at senior level with major brands and clients.

The one thing we're really looking for...

A creative who can make a drinks brand feel bigger than the product.

Someone who sees a brief and doesn't immediately think campaign.

Package & Benefits

• Salary up to £75,000–£80,000, depending on experience.
• Hybrid working.
• 23 days' annual leave plus Bank Holidays, increasing with length of service up to 30 days.
• Holiday buy/sell scheme.
• Life assurance.
• Digital GP service from day one.
• Private medical healthcare after two years' service.
• Retail discounts and lifestyle benefits.
• Employee Assistance Programme.
• Onsite gym.
• Free breakfast.
• Free onsite parking.
• Onsite café.
• Company socials and events.
• Quarterly and annual recognition awards.
• Salary sacrifice schemes.
• Free shuttle service from the local train station.

If you're a senior experiential creative with serious FMCG drinks credentials and you're ready to create work that people actually remember, this could be a very exciting next move.