BOOM! Studios, which recently made major changes in top management (see “Richie Moves to BOOM! Chairman, Out of Day-to-Day”), has announced a number of promotions and hires this week, including a new Director of Marketing and Retail Sales Coordinator.

The new Director of Marketing is Ryan Matsunaga, who comes to BOOM! from Skybound Entertainment, where he was Senior Manager, Global Marketing, and before that, Senior Manager, Marketing. Matsunaga ran campaigns for publishing, television, gaming, events, and direct-to-consumer initiatives and also handled social media and digital strategy for properties that included The Walking Dead and Invincible.

Also new to the company is Retail Sales Coordinator Harley Salbacka, who spent almost four years as Retail Manager of Blastoff Comics in the Los Angeles area and later joined Humanoids as Sales and Marketing Representative (see “Humanoids Hires DC Vet as Director of Sales and Marketing”). 

BOOM! has also hired two new editors: Elizabeth Brei, who spent three years at IDW editing original and licensed properties, including Marvel Action: Chillers and Star Wars: The High Republic Adventures; and Kathleen Wisneski, who was an editor at Webtoon and before that at Marvel, where she spent five years working on Spider-Man titles; she was the editor of, among others, Miles Morales: Spider-Man by Saladin Ahmed and Javier Garrón.

In addition to the new hires, BOOM! announced several internal promotions. Breanna Sarpey, who hosts the company’s BOOM! Chat digital interview series, has been moved up to Marketing Lead, Digital, and Amanda Lawson, who came to the company in 2018 as a Marketing Assistant, has been promoted to Marketing Coordinator. Before moving to publishing, Lawson was the manager of two comic shops, Blastoff Comics and Emerald Knights Comics and Games. Other recent promotions include Michelle Ankley to Manager, Production Design; Sophie Phillips-Roberts to Editor; and Allyson Gronowitz to Associate Editor.