&vest’s founder and Chief Executive Officer, Doug Jacob, has built his career commercializing the power of brand: transforming category challengers into cultural icons. Since successfully parlaying his Wall Street-honed finance acumen into investment in EMM Group’s era-defining Tenjune nightclub, Mr. Jacob has championed a future-focused vision of hospitality that would, in short order, come to define his meteoric rise as a brand operator and investor. Expanding Toro, into top-tier and international markets which he exited in 2017; partnering on purpose-driven, technology-pushing fast casual pizza concept, &pizza; and then building the full-service creative agency, JWALK, sold to Shiseido Corporation acquired the business in late 2017. In 2019, Mr. Jacob founded &vest – a hybrid venture fund and brand agency focused on opportunities in lifestyle verticals – where, in just 24 months, he raised and deployed $1.45b across consumer investments in brands such as fitness disrupter Rumble, ghost-kitchen innovator Butler Hospitality, virtual-try-on platform BeautyLabs, &pizza, as well as the hospitality and digital transformation SPACs, FAST and VELOCITY.

Our Chief Strategy Officer, Nick Brien, was most recently the CEO of Dentsu Aegis Network Americas. Prior to joining Dentsu in 2017, Mr. Brien was the President of Hearst Marketing Services and the global CEO of iCrossing from 2014 through 2017, and previously served as the global CEO of McCann Worldgroup, a leading global advertising network, from 2010 to 2012. As CEO of McCann Worldgroup, Mr. Brien headed a multi-disciplinary organization spanning 120 countries and employing 16,000 people. The network is comprised of five high-profile global companies entrusted by many of the world’s largest marketers, including McCann Erickson (the world’s largest advertising agency network); MRM Worldwide (digital marketing/CRM); Momentum (activation/promotion); McCann Healthcare (professional pharma communications); and CRAFT (content production). Mr. Brien had worked previously at The Interpublic Group, as global CEO of IPG Mediabrands and global CEO of UM, one of the industry’s leading media agency networks. Mr. Brien is currently a board director and compensation committee member of Outfront Media, the leading US Out-of-Home company, and serves on the NY Chapter board of the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation.

Our Chief Digital Officer, Judge Graham, is an action-oriented entrepreneur with a successful track record of growing companies and creating value through acquisitions and divestitures. Companies under his leadership have won numerous high-profile business accolades, including Inc. 5000 and multiple best places to work awards. He has also been featured in media outlets like AdWeek, Ad Age, Forbes, Bloomberg, CNBC, Money and many more. He currently is an active investor, serves on boards and is an acclaimed author. Mr. Graham is a go-to expert on helping businesses identify and capitalize on opportunities to improve revenue and corner markets through integration of cutting-edge technology, corporate culture, marketing and sales. Previously, Mr. Graham served as the Chief Digital Officer of Ansira, the second-largest independently owned customer relationship management (“CRM”) and digital marketing agency in the United States. As an executive member of their core deal team, Mr. Graham was instrumental in selling Ansira to Advent International in 2016. Prior to joining Ansira, Mr. Graham was the Co-Founder and President of Sq1, which he sold to Ansira in 2015.

Our Chief Financial Officer and Director, Garrett Schreiber, has spent his career structuring and underwriting transactions and funds in a variety of sectors. In 2012, Mr. Schreiber joined RBC Capital Markets as an investment banking analyst. Upon leaving RBC in 2014, Mr. Schreiber joined as an associate with Enhanced Capital, a portfolio company of Stone Point Capital, where he raised two tax-credit capitalized investment funds and a SBIC fund. While there, Mr. Schreiber worked on fundraising, underwriting, and reporting efforts both to the limited partners and to government regulators. In 2019, Mr. Schreiber helped launch &vest, overseeing all investment, fundraising, and creative agency operations. In 2020, Mr. Schreiber helped launch FAST Acquisition Corp., a hospitality-focused SPAC, where he currently serves as the Chief Financial Officer.