Awards went to American Eagle Outfitters, Bombas, E.L.F. Beauty, Gainful, Made In, Old Navy, TULA Skincare and Warby Parker
Recognizing the efforts, creativity and innovations of retail and ecommerce professionals is an important part of our CommerceNext community. The CommerceNexty Awards, sponsored by Simon Data, were developed to celebrate the year’s best marketing and ecommerce programs, delivering truly breakthrough results. After receiving over 100 nominations, we narrowed it down to 27 finalists across 7 categories.
Along with two special honorees, Jamie Gersch, SVP and CMO, Old Navy, Marketing Visionary winner, and Craig Brommers, CMO, American Eagle Outfitters, Digital Disruptor winner, there are seven categories of winners for 2022:
Best Use of Data or Technology in Marketing
Winner: Zack Abbell, VP Digital and Ecommerce, TULA
TULA leaned into data-driven marketing by building out its growth and analytics teams and implementing the Rockerbox measurement platform. TULA was able to establish a de-duplicated ROAS that they could consistently use to measure all marketing channels, from Facebook, Linear TV, Paid Shopping and influencer attribution while successfully testing and scaling these channels. As a result, TULA tripled its marketing spend while maintaining a positive ROAS.
Most Impactful Social Responsibility Campaign
Winner: Kate Huyett, CMO, Bombas
Ahead of last year’s Pride month, Bombas launched a dedicated line celebrating the diverse experiences, stories and intersectionalities within the LGBTQ+ community. For every Pride item purchased, an item was donated to someone in need within the LGBTQ+ community through three Giving Partners to individuals within this marginalized population who are also at-risk or experiencing homelessness
Most Effective Brand Storytelling
Winner: Lindsay Jackson, VP of Brand Marketing, Made In
Made In sits at the intersection of chef & culinary and craftsmanship. Their campaigns, which run across TV, print and digital, artfully show the beauty of craftmanship and leverage the chefs that partner with them to create the products. Everything is fully concepted, created, directed, edited and deployed in-house. Also, the inhouse studio and test kitchen is creating helpful YouTube content for customers from the world’s best chefs.
Outstanding New Ecommerce Experience
Winner: Erin Collins, VP, Ecommerce, Warby Parker
When using an iPhone 6s or above, users are guided through a simple but thorough eligibility quiz to make sure the service is a good fit. If they’re eligible, the app walks the user through an equally simple vision test that can be completed anywhere with 10 feet of space. That’s all done, from start to finish, in 10 minutes flat. Then, within two days, an eye doctor reviews the results in detail.
Best Use of New Channel
Winner: Taylor Nuk, Influencer, Affiliate and Partnerships Manager and Kamila Orzech, Influencer Coordinator, Gainful
Gainful’s program goal is to build credibility as a premium personalized performance nutrition brand. To do so, their influencer seeding efforts include engaging 250+ seeding opportunities (gifted/unpaid) per month, building a pipeline of ongoing ambassador partnerships with the right talent, and monitoring & tracking how Gainful shows up in this lower funnel space to continue to elevate the brand.
Marketing Innovator of the Year
Winner: Ekta Chopra, CDO, E.L.F
E.L.F. Beauty partnered with Chipotle to create an eye shadow palette that matched Chipotle’s restaurant colors to gain attention from Chipotle fans. The unexpected partnership between Chipotle and E.L.F. Beauty got people talking and sold out immediately.
Women in Retail’s Top Women of the Year Award
Winner: Jennifer Foyle, President, Executive Creative Director, AE & Aerie
Jennifer Foyle has recently achieved: 29 consecutive quarters of double-digit growth for Aerie, $5 billion in revenue at AEO in 2021, American Eagle bottoms business surpassing $2 billion in annual revenue in 2021, the launch of emerging brands including OFFL/NE by Aerie and Unsubscribed, rejuvenation of the American Eagle brand with creative marketing and innovative customer connections as a trailblazer in the metaverse. She has an open-door policy with team members across the organization and it isn’t unusual to find her brainstorming with everyone from interns to store associates to other c-suite members.
Marketing Visionary Award
Winner: Jamie Gersch, SVP and CMO, Old Navy
Noted Accomplishments:
- Acclaimed ad crowd-sourced on TikTok
- Responding to inflation with Price ON-Lock
- Driving Old Navy’s efforts into size inclusivity
Digital Disrupter Award
Winner: Craig Brommers, CMO of American Eagle Outfitters
Noted Accomplishments:
- Leading AEO’s metaverse efforts on Roblox Livetopia
- Innovative use of AR technology on Snapchat
- Immersive partnership with Twitch, including a docuseries on streamers
To learn more about this year’s CommerceNexty marketing and ecommerce award winners: click here.
