Consumer Insights Product Development

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Jennifer A. Blankenship

**** ***** ***. ******, ** 75214 214-***-****(c) ad5sjb@r.postjobfree.com

Insights-Driven, Passionate Consumer Marketing Director who has experience across sectors including CPG, restaurant, retail, manufacturing and financial services. Track record of top performance and the proven ability to deliver highly successful strategy, and a passion for delivering insight-driven brand management and innovation solutions.

• Marketing and Brand Strategy…excels at developing brand strategy, brand positioning and leading cross-functional teams to execute plans.

• Consumer Insights and Segmentation…highly skilled in concept development and executing various research tech- niques to deliver executable consumer insights.

• Innovation and Product Development…accomplished in full product development process, from concept to market.

• Brand and Advertising Activation…across multiple channels, including packaging, traditional, social and digital media, point-of-sale and merchandising.

PROFESSIONAL EXPERIENCE:

PAPA MURPHY’S INTERNATIONAL, based in Dallas, TX (October 2020 - March 2024) Senior Director of Brand Innovation and Consumer Insights Responsible for innovation strategy and planning, pipeline development, testing and execution for $850MM brand, including current product categories and new breakthrough innovation categories and channels; led Consumer Insights function, in- cluding brand tracking, Guest Experience team, Social Listening functions, managed all proprietary research projects and all secondary research resources and partners.

• Formalized and introduced “voice of the consumer” and “voice of the guest” feedback to the product testing process, in- cluding consumer research, analytic discipline, scorecard reporting, inclusion of guest feedback into the innovation testing process; led to 50% better success rate with LTO introductions.

• Developed and introduced new LTO calendar recommendations that drove stronger ROI with 25% shorter advertising win- dows, 10% less product waste and more agility for incremental product categories; launched new LTO guardrails that min- imized time-to-market by 50% to better capitalize on consumer trends and flavor news.

• Developed and executed 3-year innovation pipeline and strategy that included consumer validation (idea screens, concept screens, IHUT’s), in-market testing (supported through in-store, digital and social marketing), program analysis and final go/no-go recommendations; established multi-year testing and product launch calendar that drove 5% lift in sales, +13% in food quality and 12% increase in food taste and flavor scores.

• Established Add-on-Sales strategy validated through consumer insights to introduce new garlic bread; streamlined opera- tions to improve dessert category with adjacent cinnamon bread; led development, market testing and recommendation to nationally launch Garlic and Cinnamon Monkey Breads, leading to +15% average check increase and +3% AOS increase.

• Developed recommendation and led transition from solicited guest feedback system to review management platform, gen- erating 20% savings for owners.

AMERICAN LEATHER, Dallas, TX (October 2018 – July 2020) Director of Marketing

Responsible for leading all consumer and customer marketing strategy development and planning for $200MM Dallas-based luxury furniture manufacturer; led Marketing Department, responsible for planning and implementing all traditional and digital marketing programs. Managed company P&L review and reconciliation.

• Constructed and established new brand identity for American Leather including implementation of focused story-telling strategy and content calendar that reversed decline for key Comfort Sleeper and grew sales by 3% vs. YAG.

• Progressively evolved and launched new branded website which led to 3% growth vs. YAG in new visitors.

• Launched Social Media Influencer program, partnering with interior designers and fashion influencers, leading to Insta- gram follower increase of +42% in 2019; current engagement rate 1.06% (33% increase).

• Optimized dollars spent in SEM, beating industry average by 17% ($2.70 vs. $3.24). SIGNET JEWELERS (ZALES), Irving, TX (February 2015 – October 2018) Director of Brand Marketing and Innovation

Responsible for developing and driving key brand building strategies for Zales and Peoples (Canada) business units, $1.4B of the overall $6.2B Signet portfolio; led cross-functional efforts required for successful implementation of customer segmen- tation-based brand programs and managed team in the execution of storytelling to deliver brand messaging.

• Developed and executed new product launch across all Signet North American brands, a consumer insight-led con- cept scoring at parity with Signet’s most successful product launch; executed $11MM omni-channel marketing cam- paign, reaching target consumers through integrated social influencer strategy, digital and in-store campaign.

• Introduced and established new product development process which tested over 300 new concepts over three and a half years, with 75 exceeding the benchmark; over 50 concepts identified for further product development and in-market tests.

• Championed online customer community consumer insights solution to deliver more timely, effective and cost-efficient voice-of-the-customer feedback. Qualitative feedback collected on over 50 topics in the first year with a 200% ROI. 2

• Identified and implemented attribute strategy for Signet’s bridal portfolio to maximize reach among key segments, deter- mine optimal number of collections and identify white space opportunities. Analysis identified key areas for new product development (Disney) and opportunities to refine brand positioning for Vera Wang LOVE and Endless Brilliance.

• Stabilized decline (three-year negative sales trend) of colored diamond and gemstone collection by developing and imple- menting repositioning strategy resulting in improving sales from -20% to -10%.

• Developed and introduced new quantitative research process to collect quick “thumbs up/thumbs down” on new bridal and fashion jewelry styles; tested over 1,200 styles in three months, with 25% meeting or beating controls; resulted in guid- ance to Merchandising team for Holiday assortments. COMERICA BANK, Dallas, TX (February 2010 – January 2015) Senior Strategy/Brand Manager, Retail/Consumer Banking and Wealth Management Responsible for planning, managing and implementing the strategic direction of the Consumer Banking segment within $73B Top 25 financial institution; managed a team of five direct reports and partnered with Product Management, Retail Operations, Banking Center Sales, agencies and other vendors to develop and bring consumer banking solutions to market.

• Spearheaded the development of new brand positioning and creation of new brand promise, “Raise Your Expectations” based on core insight around customer satisfaction and industry ability to deliver upon it. Since implementation of new positioning, total deposits have grown by over 20%.

• Delivered customer segmentation strategy that drove strategic shift from acquiring personal deposit accounts to growing small business and wealth management by implementing targeted strategies resulting in total deposit growth of 7%.

• Managed $2MM (25% of total marketing plan) for the Retail bank containing all consumer touch points (traditional media, online media and SEM, CRM program, banking center collateral and merchandising and website presence). TGI FRIDAYS, Carrollton, TX (November 2006 – February 2010) Brand Marketing Manager

Responsible for all aspects of brand marketing for 600-unit casual dining chain, including strategic growth initiatives, marketing planning, menu strategy and optimization, concept and product innovation, pricing and consumer validation.

• Developed and tested new Endless Lunch platform to appeal to value-seeking consumers and drive traffic at Lunch. Concept scores for platform were in the 90th decile; in-market testing resulted in traffic growth of +8.6% and sales growth of +4%. Platform launched nationally in April 2009 achieving a +3% sales growth during the lunch daypart.

• Developed and launched strategy to drive additional sales and profitability during Late Night daypart and the Bar. Partnered with three markets to develop Late Night test, resulting in increased sales of +4.8%. Program launched nationally in August 2009 with increased sales of +9% in the Bar in the first two months.

• Led new product beverage innovation by partnering with R&D, Consumer Insights, Beverage Suppliers and outside consult- ants resulting in launch of four new on-trend beverages that delivered +3% growth. DR. PEPPER/SNAPPLE GROUP (NOW KEURIG DR. PEPPER), Plano, TX (September 2001 – November 2006) Associate Brand Manager, 7UP

Responsible for all aspects of brand marketing for 7UP brand including strategic brand development, leadership of cross- functional team, development and execution of line extensions, marketing, field communications and budget management.

• Developed and implemented fully integrated national marketing plan for the launch of 7UP Natural, which resulted in sales growth of 10 pts and a market share increase of 2 pts. Associate Brand Manager, Hawaiian Punch and Country Time Responsible for the leadership of several projects for the Hawaiian Punch and Country Time brands including brand planning, budget management, leading the new product development process, performing monthly performance anal- ysis and field communications.

• Managed strategic development and sell-in of four new flavors, which delivered volume increases of +10%.

• Introduced Hawaiian Punch Light product across two routes-to-market, resulting in marketing efficiencies of $1.2MM. KELLOGG COMPANY, Battle Creek, MI (July 2000 – December 2000) Assistant Brand Manager, Cereal Innovation

Responsible for evaluating new product opportunities and projected volume, developing concepts, generating line ex- tensions and food news on current brands and launching new products in the market. EDUCATION

McCombs School of Business, The University of Texas at Austin (May 2000) Master of Business Administration (MBA) – Specialization in Marketing and Entrepreneurship The University of Arizona, Tucson, AZ

Bachelor of Science in Business Administration – Specialization in Marketing

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