HigherRing is a certified B Corp, certified climate-neutral and a member of 1% for the Planet. They provide ethical outsourcing for socially responsible companies. As the Marketing Manager I recently wrapped up a huge endeavor of leading the C-Suite through a full company rebranding. Check out some of the highlights of my time with HigherRing:

  • When I spearheaded the HigherRing Marketing team, I quickly recognized that our most successful contracts were derived from the fantastic reputation of our CEO within the impact communities that she is most passionate about. But I noticed that we were not capitalizing on that reputation by being present at community events.

    I built a Community Engagement Strategy with the CEO and have since coordinated team attendance at over 60 impact events in the past two years.

    In the first year of implementing our strategy the CEO booked 20% more discovery calls and we landed two major clients directly from those events.

    • I collaborated with our strategy partner and C-Suite to redefine our positioning and revamp all service offerings. This included data analysis and internal/external interviews with a variety of stakeholders.

    • I took great care in negotiating contracts which resulted in a broader design package and a collective savings of $30k+ on our total budget. I’m proud to say I built the current HigherRing site with little prior experience in web design.

    • I singlehandedly tracked and executed the roll out of the branding across all channels.

  • HigherRing’s marketing was, respectfully, non existent when I joined the company. Since I launched the Marketing Dept as Marketing Manager I’ve been able to accomplish a lot with very little:

    • A/B testing for emails/ads/and social media.

    • Increased social media following across all accounts.

    • Implemented a full company brand redesign.

    • Built a brand new website from scratch including custom coding.

    • Developed all new messaging and strategic positioning to differentiate HigherRing from competitors and make us the obvious choice for our target clients.

    • Redefining all of our service offerings to capitalize on our strengths and building strategic partnerships to send clients elsewhere when projects are outside of our scope (of course resulting in a referral fee paid to HigherRing).

  • Being that HigherRing is such a small and collaborative team - as Marketing Manager, I have had the opportunity to work closely with the C-Suite on our decision making around our corporate social responsibility. I've supported the team in working through our messaging around each of our certifications, determining the ROI for each cert (both for the company and for the planet) as well as supporting in tracking all of our associated metrics.

    • consulting on our B Corp recertification

    • building our very first impact reports for 2022 and 2023 including researching and tracking our target SDGs.

    • supporting the leadership team with tracking metrics for reporting for climate-neutral certification.

    • collaborating with the Change Climate Project team (certifying body) to brainstorm innovative ways to meet our carbon neutral spending goals while balancing our carbon reduction planning.

    • supporting the leadership team with tracking metrics and reporting for our 1% for the Planet financial contributions.

A physical retail marketing experience originally based out of New York City’s Gallery District. Story rotated its products, customer experience and theme every six to eight weeks. In 2018 the founder Rachel Schectman sold Story to Macy’s Inc. and moved the experience from 19th street to its new home on 34th. During my time with the Story team I was responsible for curating and executing each new design and then merchandising the various product categories within each new theme. I helped break down and rebuild five different concepts from scratch including Home for The Holidays, Love Story, Work/Space, Out of Office and How Original.

Changing a theme entailed breaking down the store to cement floors and white walls before rebuilding it with entirely new flooring, fixtures, design and product. I wore many hats while at Story and seamlessly flexed between carpentry, designing, merchandising, selling, people management, budgeting, buying, project management and running events. I once spent a whole day mounting this Fun Boy kiddie pool to a wall filled with hundreds of plastic balls held in by a plexiglass front. There was never a dull moment and I loved every bit of it. Learn more about my time with STORY below.

  • I was able to continuously keep us within budget by outreaching to vendors and bartering ad placements in the store in exchange for their inventory. We then sold the pieces at the end of each concept effectively yielding a profit on the trade.

    Each concept had anywhere from hundreds to thousands of different products which meant constant communication with vendors. I was able to cultivate strong partnerships with each to build trust so they would feel confident in our merchandising decisions for their product and continue to partner with us for future concepts.

  • The Founder of Story, Rachel Schectman, is known for her creative and wildly effective merchandising strategies. I was able to partner with her directly on each concept to execute merchandising where I learned invaluable insights about consumer buying habits.

  • I assisted the Founder in building concept decks to share with potential sponsors for each theme including mood boards, design activations, details on events programming and product category research. This was vital as sponsorships allowed us the budget to build out the experiential design and events that made Story the destination that it was.

    I delegated + collaborated with our small team of 12 to build out each “room” from scratch and execute the interior design to meet the Founder’s original vision.

    When shifting between each concept, I managed the cataloging and storage of all fixtures, mannequins and experiential props. I was also in charge of budgeting and ordering for all interior design elements.

Rent The Runway is a subscription clothing rental platform that achieved unicorn status in 2019 when they reached a Billion dollar valuation. I managed the merchandising team at their Topanga location and then successfully relocated the entire store to their West Elm branch in Santa Monica. I loved being customer facing and having an opportunity to turn new customers into evangelists by making them feel like an insider. I took great care to explain the inner workings of the rental process and before I knew it I would hear my regulars repeating my words to explain the process to friends they brought into the store. Check out more about my work with RTR below.

  • Rent The Runway is often thought of as a fashion brand but at its core it’s really a tech startup. If you’ve ever worked for an app then you know that “tech startup” is a synonym for “bug fixes.” At any given moment thousands of different garments or accessories shifted from being in store, to a customer, in laundering or at a warehouse. Tracking each item and maintaining accurate inventory levels online was no small feat and so, naturally, there were times that it went terribly wrong. Hell hath no fury like a Los Angeles woman with the wrong dress size in hand days before flying to Cannes.

    I’m proud to brag that I have the ultimate chill when faced with a devastated customer and I thrive when I’m in the midst of finding a game time solution. I’ve turned numerous tears into relieved smiles. One customer actually called me an Oracle.

    After working with RTR as well as Story (see below) I have ample experience with explaining first of its kind experiences to new customers in a way that is easy to digest and makes them excited to participate. I know I can help turn potential customers or brand partners into evangelists, because I’ve done it so many times before.

  • I managed the merchandising team for the location in Topanga and after one month in the role, I was able to help the store reach its long sought after KPI of over 1K items swapped per week.

    I worked closely with the inventory manager to curate capsules for the store based on weather, trends and holidays. Together we ordered inventory and successfully executed a new floor set every 1-2 weeks. Our capsules often sold through within days and we regularly had to implement a back up floor set in between our orders.

    My strong partnership with the inventory team and thorough organization allowed for a seamless location change from Topanga to Santa Monica in less than 2 weeks.

    I helped relocate thousands of units of product out of Topanga and ordered in hundreds of new pieces to Santa Monica all while partnering with the West Elm team to curate + execute our new store design.

  • In this role I often had to connect the dots between the visual expectations of Rent The Runway and the regulations implemented by the property owner of our retail location. To build the best relationship I made an effort to be proactive with the property management team to alert them when we needed to be onsite during off hours or if we had significant changes happening to visual displays. This allowed them the opportunity to feel empowered to collaborate with me if they needed adjustments to our visual plan and it allowed me to call in for resources from my internal team before we hit a deadline.

  • Partnerships: I’ve acted as a facilitator of strong partnerships in many of my past roles. Whether it is in a merchandising role where I had to find compromise between the retailer and the vendor on how to best display their products or in a CSR role where I had to build strong connections with certifying entities in order to get questions answered for my team. Regardless of the setting, building a bridge with external and internal partners and stakeholders is one of the foundational principles that guides me in how I approach any role.

  • Customer Service + Experience: In addition to the experience listed above - much of my twenties was spent bartending, waitressing and personal styling at boutique retailers in NYC. There is no one more adept at customer service then someone that is handling your fine dining experience or helping you pick out clothing, and I have years of experience with both. I’m fantastic at diffusing difficult conversations because I can remain empathetic while finding resolution.

  • Budgeting: I’ve handled budgets in several of my past roles and most recently was responsible for implementing the first ever marketing budget for HigherRing. I’m highly organized therefore great at tracking & categorizing expenses. My resourcefulness and acute negotiation skills have always served my teams to help us remain in or under budget.

  • Events Planning: Regardless of my title I have always had a hand in planning or supporting events throughout my career. I’ve worked in catering, hospitality, retail and have coordinated experiential pop ups for Story and Rent The Runway. I can walk through a Run of Show with my eyes closed and I’m great at forming a backup plan in a pinch.

Skills:

  • Certifications: I have a thorough understanding of the internal working of CSR platforms for certifications like B Corp, 1% for the Planet and The Change Climate Project.

  • Website Building and Maintenance: I have extensive experience with SquareSpace but I’m also familiar with Wix and Wordpress. I have entry level CSS experience.

  • Systems: I am skilled with Pipedrive, Asana, Slack, Squarespace, G-Suite, Mailchimp, Active Campaign, Canva, Capcut and Airtable. I am familiar with Photoshop, InDesign, Lightroom, Premier, Shopify, Gorgias, Wix, Wordpress, Xero, Meta Ads, and Google Analytics.

Systems:

  • Bachelor’s in Advertising and Marketing Communications at The Fashion Institute (FIT) in NYC

  • Certified Nutritional Therapy Practitioner by the Nutritional Therapy Associaction

  • Certified Grief Educator trained by world renowned grief expert, David Kessler

Education:

I recently supported the team at Global Green in developing a pitch for their forthcoming Future of Food initiative to be rolled out in NYC in 2026.

In the past I have volunteered with various organizations including Sarvodaya Organic Farm (California), AmeriCorps (Michigan/Iowa) and Soul Fire Farm (New York).

Volunteer: