2007
While Mary makes her home in Boston, MA, she grew up near Osage. She and 10 of her siblings, plus her mother, attended North Iowa Area Community College and were featured in the NIACC First advertising campaign. It was truly a family tradition to attend NIACC.
After graduating from NIACC in 1969, Mary attended the Universities of Iowa and Minnesota, moved to the Florida Keys, and finally to Boston. It was in Boston that she became the first employee of successful entrepreneur Michael Bronner who founded Digitas, now one of the largest marketing firms in the country.
As the agency’s partnership expert for 25 years, Mary has developed marketing relationships for key clients that include General Motors, AT&T, American Express, Delta Air Lines, Major League Baseball, Bank of America, and Pfizer. Over her career, she has put together more than 2,500 marketing relationships between companies.
She has also published fiction in Yankee Magazine, had an article she wrote for the Journal of Marketing used by CBS 60 Minutes, and has produced op-ed pieces for both the Boston Globe and the Boston Herald. She has even written a mystery novel, A Duchess in Rubies.
Mary has traveled extensively in Europe, Australia, Asia and Africa. She took a train across Australia, has been on several safaris in Kenya, and while in Mali stayed in Timbuktu, and then sailed down the Niger River, camping along the banks. On a visit to Namibia she tracked elephants through GPS collars across the country’s deserts.
She has lived in a yurt in Mongolia, spent a month in a small village on India?s Bay of Bengal, and has traveled across China, as well as Cambodia and Thailand. She also lived in Russia for three months and sailed on a Russian trawler across Siberia?s Lake Baikal, an experience she calls “glorious yet harrowing.”
Between work and traveling, Mary managed to squeeze in college studies. She graduated with honors from Harvard University’s Extension School three years ago.
As managing partner of the S&S Group, Mary is currently developing marketing partnerships for a range of clients that include Victoria’s Secret, Amtrak, and Bath & Body Works.
