Hammond joins another recent AfterShock hire, RuthAnn Thompson, who was hired as Senior Retailer Relations Manager last month (see “Comic Execs on the Move”), in roles that support the company’s relationships with retailers. We asked AfterShock Senior Vice President of Sales and Marketing, to whom both employees will report, to clarify their roles.
“The roles do overlap somewhat in that they’re both focused on the retail community, but from different disciplines,” he explained. “RuthAnn’s position as Senior Retailer Relations Manager sees her working with retailers as their primary go-to resource for information, merchandising, promotional idea and executions, programming and generally working to create opportunities for greater AfterShock brand and title presence in-store. In that capacity, she’ll be in charge of recruiting, training, and managing our new AfterShock Army ‘ambassador’ program (for which we’re recruiting at least 30 operatives to engage with stores on a regular basis). Essentially, they’re the first line of ongoing personal contact and RuthAnn’s in charge of them. She’ll also be a regular social presence and personality for AfterShock, primarily (but not exclusively) on the retail side of things.”
Rotterdam contrasted that with Hammond’s new role. “Marc’s position of Senior Retail Sales Development Manager is a new position at AfterShock and primarily a sales management position,” he said. “He’ll be working alongside myself and Joe Pruett in analyzing internal sales data and working with accounts to increase orders and take advantage of programs we’ve put and are putting into place to bring the elusive ‘new customer’ into stores and increase sell-through. As a retailer himself, we believe he offers unique, real world perspective and experience.“
