Tumi began his career in 2001 at Young and Rubicam as a junior Art Director, where he worked on Absa, Wimpy, PG Glass and Land Rover.
In 2004 he moved to TBWA Hunt Lascaris, where he worked on Tiger Brands, BMW, Sasol and Standard Bank.
From 2007 he worked at Metropolitan Republic as part of the team that re-launched MTN, until he joined Ogilvy in 2010. As Creative Director at Ogilvy he launched Mzansi Magic – DStv’s answer to SABC 1 – and subsequently a new mass bouquet DStv Access.
He was also responsible for all of DStv Africa and SuperSport Africa creative output. While at Ogilvy, he repositioned Stoney Ginger Beer, and was creative head of the Miller Genuine Draft account. From 2013 to 2015, he was Creative Director on the SABC 1 brand at Openco and looked after 7 SABC African language radio stations – amongst them Ukhozi FM, the second biggest in the world.
As well as the above, Tumi has helped rebrand Ikwekwezi FM after 20 years of existence, overseen the SABC Sport account and led the SABC sport project between Soweto football giants Kaizer Chiefs and Orlando Pirates.
Before joining Havas as Creative Director, Tumi worked at Ogilvy Cape Town on Castle Lite and Hansa Pilsener respectively. Tumi joined Havas in June 2016, where became Joint Executive Creative Director responsible for SAA, PPS, Chivas Regal, Skye Distribution (Dickies, Brentwood, Samson & Mille) Blue Train and GSK.
In 2019 he joined McCann1886 as Executive Creative Director heading up the Reckit Benkiser portfolio which includes Dettol and Nurofen as well as Steers, Fishaways and SADV. He sat on the Creative Exco of the Nahana Group until he joined Riverbed as Executive Creative Director across all the agency brands.
In 2021 he became the ECD at the Riverbed and was the creative lead across all the agency brands including Hyundai, Nedbank, GBVF, Trust Condoms. In 2023 Tumi was head hunted to be Chief Creative Officer at Hoorah Group, leading the creative department across both Cape Town and Johannesburg in the main agency as well as the internal
agencies at Alex Forbes and Nestle, working with clients that include Debonairs, Epson, Lancewood, Kit Kat, Bar One and Cruz.
He is now a creative consultant.
Roles as jury over the years:
- Loerie Awards
- Pendoring Awards
- Creative Circle Monthly Awards
- Creative Circle Jury Chair
- New York Festival of Creativity Awards
- Effie Awards South Africa
- Mark Awards Jury Member
Creative awards over the years:
- Cannes Lion Awards
- Loerie Awards
- Pendoring Awards
- London International Awards
- New Gen Awards
- Prism Awards
Member of:
- Creative Circle SA Exco