Core Team, Atlanta USA
Beverly Anderson, Executive Vice President, Strategic Planning
Beverly is a native of upstate NY, where she received degrees in Marketing and Psychology from St. Bonaventure University, graduating Magna Cum Laude in 1985.
Beverly began her communications career in NY on the other side of the fence - the client side, that is - where she managed in-house efforts for an automotive aftermarket retail chain. In 1986, Y&RNY brought her onboard to work on Eastman Kodak Digital Healthcare Imaging, Nalgene International Labware and Bausch & Lomb.
In a gradual southern migration, Bev spent three years in Greenville SC, managing St. Francis Healthcare system, including physician and patient recruitment for the now-famous St. Francis Women's Hospital, and other outpatient facilities/programs.
In 1992, J. Walter Thompson moved Bev to Atlanta, where she worked on the US Department of Housing and Urban Development and Kimberly-Clark Professional Healthcare, including extensive physician-targeted branding for KC surgical sheets, drapes, masks, gowns and glove lines.
Bev then found her career path in planning inspired by Merkley & Partners Atlanta, where she oversaw the planning and account service teams for BellSouth Business Systems.
In her 12-year tenure at Fletcher Martin, Bev developed comprehensive corporate turn-around and brand launch plans for clients such as First Data Corporation, ChoicePoint, Alcoa Fujikura Ltd, Piccadilly Cafeterias, Cellular South Wireless, Reed Construction Data, Arby's, Carvel, InCharge, Precept Golf, InComm Mio Mastercard®, J+J/Invision, University of Florida, Tire Kingdom, BioLab brands (BioGuard, AquaChem, Greased Lightning), Knology, University of Houston and Kiz Global.
Healthcare-focused clients have included both consumer and physician initiatives for French baby product megabrand TIGEX, Danone/Suntory Water Group Brands, The Georgia Cancer Coalition (breast cancer and mammography programs, plus prostate screening initiatives), Sona MedSpas International, and US Preventive Medicine (The Prevention Plan).
Bev leads the planning process for Trend Influence AOR clients, using qualitative and quantitative techniques to find insights. First, there's the science - plans are based on a thorough situation analysis, competitive analysis, SWOT and analysis by company product/service line. Then there's the art - account planning is a critical element in plan development. Key emotional and practical considerations that lead to a purchase by customers and prospects are extracted, and niche audience segments are identified. Bev moderates much of our clients' primary qualitative research, and has led over 250 focus groups, interviews and ethnographies in the last five years alone in pursuit of consumer intelligence.
Bev is a fitness enthusiast, and spent 10 years moonlighting as an AFAA-certified fitness instructor.
Bryan Andrews, President, Digital
Bryan Andrews has worked in various capacities in Marketing and Technology and has been involved with internet related technologies since 1994.
During his years at Cox Communications he served as Program Manager, Knowledge Management Services Group where his team launched the first KM initiative for Cox Communications and Cox Enterprises. He previously headed a team that managed all external and internal web initiatives including Cox.com and Cox Intranet.
He worked many years as CTO of Trend Influence before taking on the additional role of President for AppTheory. During his tenure, he has focused the company on agile development techniques and technologies that have made the company competitive in the marketplace.
Bryan is active in the open source development community and is a contributor to the DotNetNuke open source project. He is a level 2 member of the AspElite, and a moderator and member of the AspAdvice private mentoring community.
Bryan serves on the Tenet Healthcare / Atlanta Medical Center Institutional Review Board for Ethical Human Research.
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Justin Arsenault, Research Manager, Design Specialist
Originally hailing from California, Justin originally came to Georgia to attend Savannah College of Art and Design. While at SCAD he won an internship with Procter and Gamble which lead to his adoption of an intense research based design philosophy. Graduating with a B.F.A in Industrial Design has enabled him to excel at many different design tasks from Brand Identity to complete Product Development of complex items such as bar-b-que grills.
In his role at Trend Influence, Justin leads the design strategy for clients such as Navistar and LG Electronics by supporting the cross functional teams in identification of knowledge gaps and strategic opportunities for brand and product resonance through design.
In his spare time he enjoys being physically active; a few of Justin's hobbies are coaching Academy youth soccer, cycling, riding his Harley-Davidson, and boating.
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Andrew Bauer, Director, Insight and Innovation
Andrew Bauer has been with Trend Influence since early 2005, and has since helped to usher in operational maturity and form guidelines for efficient workflows and business processes. As Project Director of Insight and Strategy, he works closely with clients, strategists, ethnographers, industrial designers and coordinators to realize research studies, uncover and communicate implications and ultimately put our teams in a position to harness and react to consumer insights.
Native to Atlanta, Andrew studied International Business in Nuremberg, Germany, becoming fluent in German and earning his Vordiplom, before returning to receive his undergraduate from Georgia State University in Business Administration with a concentration in Marketing. While abroad he worked for Deutsche Telekom's innovations branch, T-Nova Innovationsgesellschaft mbH, documenting processes and implementing European Foundation for Quality Management.
He is an accomplished guitarist, pianist and drummer, and spends any free time playing and composing music.
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Andy Fletcher, Chief Executive Officer
Andy is a graduate of the University of Florida and a self described agency brat. The four years with his father's firm, Fletcher/Mayo/Associates, included the successful launch of a full service Chicago office when he was only 26. The late 1980's included management roles with Nebraska's Swanson Russell Associates and Della Femina Travisano. Andy returned to the Midwest and founded Fletcher Gampper & Wirth, a direct response agency in Kansas City. He closed the shop after six years and became President of Barkley Evergreen & Partners in Kansas City. His leadership helped shift the primarily automotive aftermarket agency into one of the premier retail agencies in America.
Andy joined Atlanta's Tausche Martin Lonsdorf in 1995 as a Partner, President and Chief Executive Officer. The agency became Fletcher Martin in 1999, two years prior to the partial sale of the company to MDC Partners. Best known for their work in the multi-unit franchise industries, Fletcher Martin served a cross section of clients in both consumer and retail categories. In 2009, Andy was instrumental in the merger of Fletcher Martin and The Trend Core Group of companies into Trend Influence. His career client list includes Carvel Ice Cream, Learjet, Northwest Airlines, TWA, Arby's, Sonic Drive-Ins, NTW, Helzberg Diamonds, General Electric, and Energizer.
Andy is an active participant and frequent speaker in the industry. He serves on both the Atlanta Council and National Board of the 4A's, the National Advertising Review Board, and recently completed his two year term as president of MAGNET, an international network of over 40 independent agencies. In addition, Andy is on the Advisory Board for the Advertising Department at the University of Florida, as well as the Savannah College of Art and Design.
Ashley Haddock Covey, Account Executive, Insight and Innovation
Ash is originally from the Volunteer State, Ashley graduated from the University of Tennessee with a Bachelor of Science in Communication. With an emphasis on Journalism and Electronic Media, she started her career as a reporter, anchor and producer at WBBJ-TV in Jackson, Tennessee. During her time with the ABC affiliate, Ashley covered everything from the deadly 2008 tornados that rocked rural West Tennessee, to the nationally followed Mary Winkler trial. Feeling the itch to be in a larger market, Ashley made the move to agency life with the Atlanta based marketing communications agency, Fletcher Martin. There she supported a number of clients with event coordination, media relations and strategic messaging including J+J/Invision, The Warrick Dunn Foundation and Greased Lightning, a multipurpose cleaner.
Ashley joined Trend Influence as an Account Executive, Insight & Innovation. She manages all aspects of client business including client relations, project management and deliverable development for a variety of clients from beverage to pharmaceutical.
Pete Heid, Executive Creative Director
Pete' love affair with advertising blossomed in a NYC boutique agency called Slater, Hanft, Martin. It was here while burning the midnight oil on major league clients such as Bic, Sony and Shop Vac, that Pete became a life-long Yankees fan.
He migrated south to Earle Palmer Brown, a Bethesda agency, and sharpened his copywriting skills on fast food gems like Roy Rogers and Golden Corral. He was responsible for award-winning work on Pepco, USAIR, WorldCom and the American Floral Marketing Council.
Fletcher Martin invited him to the table to feast on clients like Arby's, Mrs. Winner's and Lee's Famous Chicken. When he wasn't gorging on a Fudgie the Whale cake, he created award-winning work for Carvel Ice Cream, E-Z-GO, Precept Golf, University of Florida, Knology Cable and Bridgestone Golf.
Unlike most creative folks in the business, Pete doesn't have a screenplay in his desk drawer, nor is he biding his time until he can join the writing staff of Saturday Night Live. Perhaps it's because his true passion is developing strategic creative work for clients. When he's not banging away at the keyboard, you can find him watching Mad Men, or spending time with his lovely wife.
Katarina Johnson, Consumer Anthropologist
Katarina joined Trend Influence in August, 2007, bringing with her an extensive background in healthcare, biotech, and public health research. As Consumer Anthropologist, Katarina functions as ethnographer and culture expert, implementing Trend Influence's custom research techniques.
Katarina is an experienced interviewer; her most recent projects involving consumers, experts, patients, and sales representatives. She is also a skilled quantitative analyst whose survey research experience includes project design and management, questionnaire development, data collection, and data analysis. She served as a consultant on strategic marketing issues including demand forecasting and optimization, positioning, and brand equity assessment. Katarina has led the team as ethnographer, culture expert, and consumer anthropologist for insight projects such as Toyota Motor Services, The Home Depot, International Truck and Engine, Kimberly-Clark, The Coca-Cola Company, and Genentech.
Katarina's broad experience also includes acting as the primary research assistant on two quality-of-life studies within the Wharton School's Healthcare Systems Department. Her work from these projects has recently been published in several international science journals. Additionally, Katarina draws from her experiences studying at the Ethnographic Field School of Medical Anthropology in Monteverde, Costa Rica. She graduated summa cum laude from the University of Pennsylvania in 2003 with a B.A. in Anthropology and Psychology.
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Richard Leslie, President, Insight and Innovation Group
Richard is a Partner and President of Trend Influence, a global brand and product innovation agency grounded in primary consumer insight. His dexterity and proficiency as a marketer is directly related to the varied roles he has successfully performed throughout his career, but the foundation of his empathy with human behavior was derived from his active participation in formative years in cutting edge youth culture including alternative music and sports.
Richard's professional experience includes; Deep knowledge of both Qualitative and Quantitative Market Research, Strategic Brand Positioning and Product Development, Integrated Promotional and Creative Strategy. He has extensive, intimate knowledge and experience with many leading global brands such as Levi Strauss, Coca-Cola, McDonald's, Toyota, Lexus, Scion, Kimberly-Clark, Timberland, Volkswagen, Navistar, Unilever, Absolut Vodka, Ford Europe, Cruzan Rum, Plymouth Gin, Tiger Beer, Ministry of Sound, Reebok, Camel, Winston and Salem Cigarettes.
In his 'spare' time, Richard enjoys travelling, tennis, cycling, surfing, reading history, listening to his extensive record collection and spending as much time as possible with his family and Bailey and Weller, his beloved pointers. Richard is an active member of the research, marketing and design community; he is a member of the Industrial Designer's Association of America (IDSA), the American Association of Advertising Agencies (AAAA), and sits on the Board of Directors of MODA, The Museum of Design Atlanta.
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Austin K. Mahler, Account Executive
Austin K. Mahler is account Supervisor, Insight & Innovation with Trend Influence. Austin assists in all aspects of client work including strategic planning and tactical execution. Austin joins Trend Influence from Fletcher Martin where she served as the lead on various accounts such as J+J/Invision, Greased Lightning Multipurpose Cleaner and TreeZero Paper Products.
Previously, Austin supported the strategic communications on several accounts at The Robin Shepherd Group including THE PLAYERS and THE TOUR Championships, The World Golf Hall of Fame, The First Tee, Blue Cross Blue Shield of Florida and Lowe Destination Development. Prior to joining The Robin Shepherd Group, Austin gained experience with WJXT TV/Jacksonville Jaguars and at Fleishman-Hillard International Communications in Atlanta. Austin earned a BS in Public Relatio ns from the University of Florida.
John Osborne, Art Director
John Osborne has consistently brought our clients both a discerning eye for design and a conceptual mind for big picture thinking for the past five years. Everyone knows a good designer or a talented art director. But it can be rare to find an Art Director with real design chops. You can find his distinctive mark on such brands as Arby's, Coke, BioGuard, Greased Lightning, Carvel, the University of Florida, J+J/Invision and MODA. And when he's not designing a new identity or dreaming up a new print campaign, he's consuming as much pop culture as possible.
Barry Morsillo, Director, Strategic Development
Barry joined Trend Influence in July 2007 as the Director of Business Development. Previously, Mr. Morsillo served as a Director for Imaginatik, a software and professional services company specializing in innovation and idea management technology platforms for Fortune 500 organizations.
Prior to Imaginatik, Mr. Morsillo served as the Director of Sales for Global Market Insite (GMI), a leader provider of market research software and global online panels for consumer and business quantitative research. Mr. Morsillo was also the Director of Sales for Nielsen/NetRatings, the global leader of Internet Audience Measurement solutions including analysis of online audiences, advertising, video, consumer-generated media, word of mouth, commerce and consumer behavior.
Mr. Morsillo graduated from the University of Florida with a BS degree in construction management.
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Jeff Peters, Vice President, Insight and Innovation Group
Jeff works closely with the core project team as the client advocate, grounding our thought partnership with the client's business objectives. He also works closely with the new business team & advances TREND INFLUENCE's agenda for organizational and methodology optimization.
Jeff is a highly accomplished marketing, innovation and advertising executive, with a successful track record of branding and launching products on Madison Avenue for companies as diverse as M&M Mars, AT&T, Pepsi, Gillette, Pfizer and DeBeers. Jeff managed M&M's "Chocolate is Better in Color" brand reintroduction - awarded Advertising Age's 10 Big Ideas in Marketing, 2004. While at Arnell Group, Jeff led comprehensive strategic recalibration for brand, product & experiential levels for Lipton Tea - Ready-To-Drink and Leaf formats. His agency career includes J.Walter Thompson, Young & Rubicam, Kirshenbaum & Bond and Arnell Group.
Jeff is a sports and music enthusiast enjoying running, biking and piano. He volunteers with Puppies Behind Bars, training Labrador puppies to become guide dogs for the blind and explosive detection dogs for law enforcement.
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Reagan Schmidt, Operations Manager
Reagan joins Trend Influence from a media migration company, VidiPax, LLC where she served as the Finance, Contracts and Administration Manager. Reagan earned a bachelor's degree in accounting from Western International University and in her role with Trend Influence, she leads or supports various financial, human resource, team and location support initiatives.
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Max Schneider, Systems Analyst
Max is on his second round with Trend Influence and has worked with the company for a total of 6 years. During his tenure he has helped grow and manage Information Technology resources for Trend Influence. His duties as a Systems Analyst cover a wide range of responsibilities including knowledge of operating systems, database servers, web servers, hardware, security, and programming. Max works closely with the team to ensure that the setup, deployment, and configuration of the internal and client facing project environments are correct. His other duties include the management of the Trend Influence servers, workstations, and IT infrastructure.
Max has ten years of experience in IT beginning in 1999 when he worked as a contractor assisting clients with deploying network infrastructures. After that, he pursued a programming position at the Warranty Corporation of America, developing applications to track and monitor client claims. Max's first project at Trend Influence was on the UMIX portal. Since that time, his responsibilities have grown into a variety of Information Technology project work in fields such as retail, marketing, and sales. Max's current projects include working with DotNetNuke, MOSS 2007, Amazon Elastic Cloud Computing, and Microsoft's Azure.
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Global Specialist Team
Bill Douglas, Qualitative Research Specialist
Bill has fifteen years of experience in marketing research and seven years in information technology. For eight years, Bill progressed through increasing levels of responsibility at The Coca-Cola Company global headquarters in Atlanta, Georgia, USA. He began as a Research Manager in the Corporate Marketing Division, managing key global tracking studies, advertising testing, beverage data suppliers, marketing mix models, and other multi-country research projects. He then became a Senior Consumer Insights Manager in The McDonald's Division, supporting Coca-Cola's largest foodservice customer with international qualitative and quantitative research studies. Later he was assigned to be the Director of Strategic Planning and Insights for the Beverage Partners Worldwide joint venture with Coca-Cola and Nestle, conducting research with marketing managers to develop new brand positioning for Nestea and related products.
Previously, Bill worked in marketing research for several years at Kellogg's in breakfast categories and Reynolds' Consumer Products in household kitchen products. Bill's projects have covered a wide range, including market segmentation studies, new product development, sources of growth modeling, focus groups, competitive analysis, controlled store tests, advertising and merchandising testing and tracking, research designs and processes, and complex customer and supplier relationships. Bill holds an MBA from The University of Virginia's Darden School, with an emphasis in marketing and quantitative analysis, and a BS in Mathematics and Computer Science from Mississippi College. Prior to graduate school, Bill worked at IBM as a Systems Engineer, and is also an experienced presenter and instructor in several areas, including total quality management and team-building courses.
Bill is a member of AMA, MRA, and QRCA, and a graduate of the RIVA Training Institute's Fundamentals of Moderating program. Bill is also a volunteer on the board of directors of Marketing Research Institute International, which oversees the Principles of Marketing Research, the premier online distance-learning course used by companies around the world to educate their staff on the Core Body of Knowledge.
Jeff Duvall, Brand Strategy Consultant
Jeff supports Trend Influence as a brand strategy expert leveraging a unique background and perspective, operating cross functionally across many aspects of brand and product development. Jeff has an extensive and diverse record of achievement, ranging from his years as an economist in the public sector (at the USDA funded Food Marketing Policy Center), a sector research manager for Information Resources, Inc (which was the largest Marketing Research Company in the USA during Jeff's tenure) Jeff earned a great reputation for his client service skills in supporting P&G's Food and Beverage team at their global headquarters, and 8 years of marketing strategy support at The Coca-Cola Company.
In 1997, Jeff was recruited by The Coca-Cola Company to support global initiatives in their Strategic Marketing Presearch, Research and Trends group. During his tenure there, Jeff pursued a rare experience path and learning curve across many different marketing insight and brand support functions, including quantitative analysis, qualitative investigation, brand equity, trends and foresights, health and wellness, and new product innovation (USA and Global Groups).
Recognizing the need to rethink traditional marketing approaches, Jeff was granted the rare opportunity to embark on an educational sabbatical to pursue his PhD in Sociology with the intent of helping companies like The Coca-Cola Company (and other Fortune 1000 companies) to recognize opportunities to support altruistic and environmentally friendly causes and programs in a manner that strengthens brand equity, corporate reputation, consumer resonance, and price premiums, thereby helping the world while helping brands and their shareholders. This PhD will complement prior degrees in Economics (M.A.), Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics (M.S.), and Marketing (B.S.).
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Audrey Holocher, Qualitative Research Specialist
Audrey is an experienced interviewer and supports Trend Influence's qualitative market research initiatives. She believes that great researchers are great storytellers, and she uses the power of story to reveal the frequently complex and contradictory emotional landscapes consumers navigate when making purchasing decisions. Audrey helps to bring consumer anecdotes to life to validate current understanding and to generate new insights that drive brand, product and service innovation.
Audrey is a Master Practitioner in Neuro Linguistic Programming, a methodology that studies the human experience and the models we create to make sense of our world. She draws from the principles of NLP to elicit compelling stories that will stick in people's minds.
Audrey has extensive experience in pharmaceutical, food & beverage, auto, insurance and other industries. She's interviewed thousands of people across the country for many global brands including GlaxoSmithKline, General Mills, Honda and Harley-Davidson. Audrey has a background in advertising and branding and a formal education in the sciences, B.S. Food Science & Technology and M.S. Environmental Science & Engineering. Her diverse background inspires her interest in eco-conscious movements, health and wellness trends, and open innovation. When she's not on the road, she lives in a small town in MN with her wise and patient husband, Peter, and beloved Olde English Bulldogge, Bess.
Oliver Perrin, Semiotics and Brand Specialist
Oliver provides the Trend Influence team with additional strategic brand insight, focusing on how human beings have used marks to organize and integrate their behavior throughout history. Oliver specializes in the creation and deployment of brand marks, the corporate insignia that people use to orient themselves in today's consumer landscapes.
Oliver entered the world of advertising, marketing and branding almost 20 years ago, working his way up through successive positions as a prepress operator, graphic designer, art director, copywriter, creative director and consultant working in Atlanta and in Istanbul, Turkey.
He has worked with clients such as Volkswagen North America, Coca-Cola (CCE), News Outdoor Turkey, American Cancer Society, College Television Network (now MTVu) and Japan Tobacco International (Turkey). He is a coeditor and contributor to Traditional Marking Systems (forthcoming in 2010) and author of "Action and Reaction in a Network Environment" in The Flashbang Book (2003).
When he's not puzzling over obscure symbols Oliver studies Flamenco and plays Taiko, the traditional drumming of Japan. He also writes screenplays: he co-wrote the independent feature film Crude which received the 2003 IFP Los Angeles Film Festival Target Filmmaker Award For Best Narrative Feature, and was featured at the Seattle, Torino and Stockholm International Film Festivals during the same year.
Janie Sun, Research and Business Strategy Specialist
Janie is a forward-thinking, seasoned market researcher and business consultant of more than fifteen years with Fortune 500 and top global research firms, and a solution-driven strategist, recognized for infusing new ideas to increase profitability and performance. She is an effective motivator who devises innovative ways to connect advisors, partners, and resources to accomplish goals.
Janie has worked with a number of client and agency companies where she cultivated her experiences as a global business consultant and market researcher. When she was with the marketing team for The Coca-Cola Company in China, she managed all business and consumer insights initiatives associated with new product development. In this role, she successfully helped the company to introduce and re-launch six brands, including a juice brand which ranked #2 in market share one year after its debut. When Janie worked at Coca-Cola in Atlanta with its global marketing team, she was managing the company's largest consumer tracking study across the global markets. During her tenure with GfK Group in New York, a leading global market research firm, Janie developed an advanced research protocol that saved the company and client significant time and money, winning her a client satisfaction award from a Fortune 500 client. Her innovative spirit consistently earned her accolades with Zyman Group, a management consulting firm, where she successfully led many global B2C and B2B insight projects with global Fortune 500 clients.
Janie holds a M.S. in Statistics from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, and B.S. of Electrical/ Mechanical Engineering from China Northern University. Janie continues her EMBA education at Harvard University.