Melissa Stewart
Rogers,AR
Summary
Versatile, high-performing, and results-oriented marketing leader with more than 25 years of retail, marketing communications and omni shopper marketing experience leading exceptional brands at retail, agency and CPG companies. Career milestones include high performance team building, revenue growth achievement and a comprehensive retail and shopper marketing understanding that turns ideas into action. Whether leading brainstorms or practicing servant leadership, Have perfected working across companies, categories and teams to build and deliver profitable initiatives in dynamic retail landscapes including Mass, Drug and Club.
Overview
29
29
years of professional experience
Work History
Omni Shopper Team Lead
Reckitt
04.2021 - Current
- Lead omni shopper strategic planning and execution for Mass and Drug customers.
- Partner across external agencies, internal Brand/Trade/Insights and Sales teams to create shopper programs and merchandising solutions that deliver profit.
- Manage annual budgets of more than $15MM.
- Responsible for strategic development of Health shopper AOP amplifying brand plans or building store back plans for all Reckitt Health brands including UR, VMS, IW and PC.
- Drive JBP shopper spends with sales, retailers, and retail media customers in partnership with brand and internal media teams.
- Develop team members to be independent, results driven, content experts in omni shopper field to drive positive ROIs through turnkey programs that entice and engage retailers with customer-first lens.
- Plan and implement more than 100 programs across key sync periods covering all brands and four retailers with key targets and individual objectives per activity including close work with analyst and category teams to analyze returns.
- Led Shopper DNA creation in conjunction with shopper insights to ground organization in one shopper truth per brand at retailers.
- Created micro-season shopper program resulting in 19% sales lift with plans to activate larger year two.
- Leading $2MM WMC program currently as first of its kind for Reckitt bringing brand sponsorship to life at retail.
- Drove creation of ASP pitch deck in conjunction with Walmart partners designed to convince the organization to activate HSA/FSA both bigger and sooner than originally planned. Cross-functional work stream mapping led to impressive size of prize presentation.
Customer Marketing
Bayer Consumer Health
02.2017 - 04.2021
- Led shopper marketing and display work for Bayer brands at Walmart and walmart.com in Footcare, Nutritionals and Upper GI categories.
- Worked with brand teams and Walmart to create and deliver shopper programs that included feature placement and 42% brand sales lift with year two commitment.
- Collaborated with sales team to develop insights-driven cross-selling strategies, resulting in higher revenue growth.
- Optimized promotional offers by analyzing effectiveness of past campaigns, driving higher conversion rates.
- Served as Executive Sponsor for Bayer participation in NWA Heart Walk.
Vice President, Account Services
TPN
11.2015 - 01.2017
- Client lead managing shopper marketing planning and support for CPG companies focused on winning at retail with Walmart and the Club channel.
- Created and activated key seasonal programs designed to drive excitement and sales with both the customer and shopper.
- Client outpaced the total category growth across two seasons by 1%.
- Worked closely with field rep teams to adapt shopper-marketing plans into executable merchandise displays by store location and type.
- Managed the 'digital life' behind in-store category reinvention testing.
- Cultivated partner relationships across key client departments, the customer, suppliers, and vendors to deliver growth opportunities across the entire portfolio and seasons focus, and represent clients with local 501c3 organizations and missions in Northwest Arkansas..
Sr. Vice President, Group Director
Catapult Marketing
06.2004 - 07.2015
- Northwest Arkansas lead overseeing all Walmart and Sam’s Club shopper marketing planning for Fortune 500 clients and variety of smaller accounts—new business and project-based programming.
- Servant led office of 20 team members consisting of both account and creative groups whose sole focus was strategic planning and business growth with local client teams.
- Served as thought leader and Walmart and Sam’s Club shopper marketing expert across entire Catapult network of offices.
- Key account team represented $4.5 million in annual .company revenue
- Achieved 200% revenue growth in 5 years.
- Cultivated relationships across client channels to retain and increase business resulting in annual revenue growth averaging 4-10% with 2+ year clients.
- Directed shopper marketing plan investments ranging from $1.5 million to $20+ million leveraging seasonal business opportunities including co-op programs, FSI’s, print, digital marketing campaigns, demos and in-store activity.
Sr. Manager, Corporate Communications, Marketing & Merchandise
Walmart Stores, Inc.
01.1998 - 06.2004
- Led creation and implementation of strategic brand marketing communication programs designed to drive sales at Walmart stores and Sam’s Clubs.
- Managed outside promotional client services group for both retailers, and researched, designed and pursued co-marketing and retailtainment promotional opportunities with internal merchant teams and suppliers.
- Served as company spokesperson on variety of proactive and reactive issues and coached executive level presentations to audiences of more than 20,000.
Sr. Account Executive
Waggener Edstrom
01.1995 - 01.1998
- Developed communication and marketing strategies and campaigns in conjunction with overall marketing objectives
- Managed daily media and analyst relations on national and regional level for a variety of national technology and telecommunications clients
- Clients included Microsoft, Amazon.com and a variety of tech start-up companies
- Arranged national influencer press tours with both media and analyst audiences; assisted in the creation of client presentations; media trained clients and managed press meetings.
Category Shopper Insights
Elizabeth Arden
01.2015 - 07.201
- Led creation, development and implementation of integrated consumer/shopper/customer marketing plans for both internal and external customers to grow category retail sales
- Analyzed available insights along with retail POS to identify and provide best in class trends to drive category growth
- Worked directly with Walmart and Sam’s Club buyers and buying support teams to define opportunities and marry strategies with sales, marketing and total EA category management team
- Business opportunity root cause focus versus just acknowledge symptoms approach
- Developed in-depth analysis of fragrance shopper in mass channel through surveys/custom insights research
- Awareness, conversion and leakage were focus points within the analysis
- Identified customer objectives, value-added insights and analyses to create plans to implement, track and manage opportunities to grow the fragrance business at Walmart and Sam’s Club
- Created shopper decision trees to identify gaps of unmet customer needs within a planogram layout
- Identified opportunities and recommended tactics to win in small format stores.
Education
B.S., Retail Merchandising -
University of Arkansas
01.1993
Skills
- High performance team leader
- Positive relationship builder
- Strategic marketing sales professional
- Passionate shopper marketer
- Strong work ethic
- Creative thinker
Additional Information
PTP Institute Faculty Member and Speaker, 2014
Doing Business in Bentonville Panelist, Influencer Marketing, 2018
Women Unlimited IMpower Graduate, 2018
Board Member, NWA Autism Involves Me
Timeline
Omni Shopper Team Lead
Reckitt
04.2021 - Current
Customer Marketing
Bayer Consumer Health
02.2017 - 04.2021
Vice President, Account Services
TPN
11.2015 - 01.2017
Category Shopper Insights
Elizabeth Arden
01.2015 - 07.201
Sr. Vice President, Group Director
Catapult Marketing
06.2004 - 07.2015
Sr. Manager, Corporate Communications, Marketing & Merchandise
Walmart Stores, Inc.
01.1998 - 06.2004
Sr. Account Executive
Waggener Edstrom
01.1995 - 01.1998
B.S., Retail Merchandising -
University of Arkansas