As the Chief Marketing Officer, Laura led the transformation of CI's branding and global communications, and fundamentally reshaped CI's corporate partner collaborations to include global marketing and high visibility public awareness campaigns with Starbucks, McDonald's, Walmart, and Disney among many others.
The outreach campaigns helped increase brand awareness for CI by over 400 percent and raised over $2.5 million dollars in additional funding annually.
An original team leader in developing the strategy and implementing the design of this first-of-its-kind scientific data 'scorecard' for nearly 200 countries and unique marine regions to annually assess the health and sustainability of our seas.
OHI informs smarter, more effective decisions about how to protect marine ecosystems---by governments, businesses, and communities--- by providing a means to advance comprehensive ocean policy and compare ongoing progress.
Laura led the strategic branding, design, event production and communications for the world's preeminent marine honor—now referred to as the 'Academy Awards for the Ocean' and the 'who's who' blue gala event on both coasts.
Co-founded by Wendy Benchley and David Helvarg, and named in honor of Peter Benchley, author of Jaws and lifelong shark and ocean advocate, the Benchley Awards were established to recognize and celebrate the work and dedication of these individuals and to foster cross-discipline collaboration to expand on their ocean solutions.
Wendy Benchley is a renowned global voice for protecting sharks and safeguarding our seas. As a scuba diver for more than forty years, she has witnessed dramatic changes to our ocean’s wildlife and its habitats. This has motivated her vigorous efforts to help shape smarter, stronger environmental and marine policies with government officials, NGOs and other civic leaders.
Better Data. Better Decisions. For People, Nature and Agriculture.
Developed the branding, partner marketing and internal communications platform for a groundbreaking, big-data driven conservation initiative covering six African nations, that was funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and managed by Conservation International.
Importantly, these measurements are made at all scales that are relevant to agricultural decision making—from a household to a farm, a landscape, and at the scale of a nation, a continent, and the globe.
The strategic challenge of Vital Signs was making very complex data science relevant, compelling and helpful to high-level policy makers and world leaders. We succeeded by using the power of big data married to story telling and stunning imagery from each African nation.
Laura was the Vice President of Strategic Marketing for The Walt Disney Company, where she focused her branding skills on assessing the strengths and marketing opportunities of the company's numerous distinct groups, including ABC, ESPN, Miramax, Disney Theme Parks, Disney Cruise Lines, Disney Consumer Products, and Disney Interactive.
Laura was a Senior Partner at Ogilvy where she worked on some of the Agency's most prestigious accounts, including IBM and American Express. She started as an Account Supervisor, but made her mark as a 'creative collaborator' with branding strategists, copywriters, art directors , and media planners.
She was a partner in establishing a unique division within Ogilvy, called 'The Brand Integration Group' (BIG) where she led the development of a qualitative and quantitative model to assess the strength of brands. BIG's four pillars of strong brands is a timeless model that can help every brand focus on why they are unique and how to keep that going.
When Laura arrived in D.C. she was distressed by the state of the street tree boxes, which were covered in litter and looked shabby. She worked with the Georgetown Citizen’s Council to agree on a plan for using pots and appropriate plantings to ensure the health of the 150 year old Oak and Elm trees that flanked her street corner. She fully landscaped the entire south wall and back patio. Over the course of her first five years, the outside garden and front entryway became a neighborhood landmark. They were photographed by hundreds of people who walked by each month and many inquiries were made asking whether the property was associated with the prestigious Dunbarten Oaks Public Gardens (two blocks north). Over the course of a decade, she helped ten neighbors add new gardens to their properties and her property was awarded blue ribbons every year from 2007 - 2016 by the Georgetown Garden Club.
Laura moved into a corner flat in the heart of Georgetown, where she began acting as a residential curator on her own. She began a decade long process of rejuvenating the property and developed a strong reputation for making every season beautiful—both inside and outside her residence.
During the depths of the Great Recession, the property owner, came to inspect the property and was stunned by the tasteful renovation work she had completed at her own expense. He offered to significantly reduce her rent as an incentive to keep her oversight rejuvenation work going.
The renovation work she completed was primarily cosmetic & interior design focused. She purchased all new kitchen appliances; purchased and had professionally installed tasteful, high-end light fixtures throughout; painted all rooms herself; installed durable and attractive sisal runners with special furniture staples (that would not hurt the stairs) and hand painted woodwork to secure the runners; she refinished the hardwood floors in the living room and downstairs dining and grand piano salon.
Laura lived inside as a renovation ‘quarterback’ to overhaul a one-of-a-kind, Amish-built New England Farmhouse (Saltbox) in northeastern Ohio, which was hand-crafted in the 1960’s, but had gone into extreme disrepair with its foundation compromised, 90 percent of all windows no longer opened, and nearly two acres of one hundred year old trees had been taken over by invasive overgrowth.
Bringing this American Farmhouse, which had been featured in magazines in the 1970’s back to new grandeur a half century later, required pulling an exceptional team of talented local contractors, artisans and woodworking craftsman together to solve problems—structural, aesthetic, and functional—and make every decision with timeless good taste (to match the integrity of the original home).
The custom wide-cut, white oak hardwood floors were newly refinished; handcrafted shiplap & custom-cut beams throughout the house were brought back to original luster; field stone & brick fireplaces were restored; 35 new windows/casings/crowns and new skylight were installed, 30 hand-carved white oak kitchen cabinets doors and butcher block countertops were fully restored by an antique wood specialist and all new stainless steel kitchen appliances were installed; the entire house freshly painted by a artisan who specialized in pine wood stain and wall paper removal.
