• by Steve McClellan  @mp_mcclellan, September 16, 2014

Dentsu-owned 360i is heading west to establish its first West Coast office, in Los Angeles, the agency has confirmed. The new office will be led by a group relocated from the shop’s New York headquarters. That group in turn will be led by Strategy Director Rich Reigart.

The opening of the new office comes after a year of solid growth with new assignments from big marketers including InBev, Pernod-Ricard and Nestle’s Lean Cuisine.

Two big clients will managed out of L.A. including Toyota and NBC Universal, for  which the shop handles social media duties for a number of the entertainment company’s brands.

The expectation is that the new L.A. office will reel in new clients and generate further growth. “There has been a lot of demand from current and prospective clients to expand our U.S. presence coast-to-coast to lead integrated digitally-centric marketing and communications,” said 360i CEO Sarah Hofstetter.  “With our LA office, we can capitalize on all of the opportunity in the region and give our business more room to attract the best clients and talent.”

The L.A. office opening follows the recent expansion of the agency’s C-Suite to manage the shop’s growth. Three agency insiders were promoted to new senior posts including SVP of strategy Lee Maicon who was named Chief Strategy Officer.  VP of Marketing and Operations Amanda Malko was appointed CMO and SVP of Finance David Perkins was elevated to CFO.

The L.A. office is the fourth new outpost for the agency in two years. In 2013 it opened offices in London, Toronto and Sao Paulo. The agency with 700 staffers, also has offices in Atlanta and Chicago.

Other clients include Oreo, Clinique, Coca-Cola and Kraft. Dentsu bought 360i in 2010.