What: Horizon Media is strengthening and expanding cross-cultural capabilities for which it has as Vice President, Managing Director, Multicultural Brand Strategy and Jerly Marquez as Associate Director of Multicultural Brand Strategy .
Why it matters: Major agencies are adding a “multicultural layer” to add a multicultural focus and expertise to Total Market accounts (e.g. see Xavier Mantilla’s new position at UM in New York.)
Horizon Media is strengthening its existing cross-cultural capabilities as the company continues to infuse cross-cultural experts across all of its brand teams. For this reason it has appointed Karina Dobarro as VP, managing director, multicultural brand strategy to lead the multicultural brand strategy practice within the agency. Joining her is Jerly Marquez as associate director of multicultural brand strategy. Dobarro will report to Stan Fields, EVP, Managing Partner at Horizon Media, and Marquez will report to Dobarro.
Dobarro joins Horizon Media from Mindshare where she was Managing Director of multicultural marketing. She has developed successful multicultural campaigns for many leading brands, including AT&T, Unilever, Macy’s, Volkswagen, and Kimberly Clark.Dobarro is a multicultural marketing leader with particularly strong Hispanic market expertise. She spent the last six years working across GroupM’s portfolio of agencies including Mindshare and MEC. Prior to Mindshare she was the Senior Partner, Account Director at MEC, and managing communications planning for clients such as AT&T, Ikea and Campbell’s. Previously she spent four years at the Vidal Partnership. She started her career at Initiative Media, first in San Francisco and in New York where she worked on Bayer, Elizabeth Arden and Burlington Coat Factory.
Jerly Marquez joins Horizon from GroupM, where she spent six years as a U.S. Hispanic and multicultural market specialist supporting WPP media agencies Maxus, MEC, MediaCom and MindShare. Jerly started her career at The Vox Collective as a Media Planner/Buyer, where she was responsible for the development and execution of prominent Hispanic campaigns for clients, such as Verizon Wireless, Office of National Drug Control Policy, Fifth Third Bank and Macy’s.
“I’m thrilled to be joining the agency as multicultural lead to further elevate and grow this facet of the business. Nearly half of adult Millennials, the coveted 18-34 demographic, are multicultural. This is the highest share of non-white Americans in any generation. Given this demographic shift, it is paramount that communications planning continues to evolve and reflect this cultural diversity,” said Karina Dobarro, VP Managing Director of multicultural brand strategy at Horizon Media.
“We have an advanced multi-cultural practice.These new hires further strengthen our leadership and proven ability to develop engaging and culturally relevant communications for our clients.”
