At Mackie Biernacki, Steph Mackie is Co-Founder and Co-CCO, with a soft spot for business-changing ideas that haven’t been done before. With over 25 years in advertising, she has held creative leadership roles at both large multinationals and small independent boutiques in Toronto and London.


She brings global experience across Canada, the UK, and the USA, and has been parachuted into markets like Beijing and Dubai to crack difficult briefs. Her work has earned Cannes Lions, One Show Pencils, and Clios, and has been featured on TED’s Ideas Worth Sharing.

As self-professed business junkies, the agency are investors in—or become full-scale partners in—four client brands to date. The first began as a passion project to redesign and reposition a naturopathic athletic product Steph couldn’t live without, but couldn’t stand looking at.

Steph has helped launch three agencies from scratch, including the 14-year-old Mackie Biernacki, and created a legally precedent setting campaign that successfully helped save a Canadian city from bankruptcy. One of her previous campaigns still holds a world record for building the world’s largest petri dish.