Co-hosts Brad Forsythe and Ray Schilens interview Drew Stoddard, Founder and CEO of InterAir
Media, a West Palm Beach, Florida-based firm that is the only media buying and
placement agency engaged solely in airline/airport marketing and advertising.
Other firms may have a
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division, but InterAir Media exists solely to help
advertisers and their agencies design an aviation ad plan that fully integrates
into an overall campaign strategy.
The inception of the firm in 2005 was the result of
an in-office brainstorming session at his ad agency in which Mr. Stoddard
conceived of a solution for the airline and airport media industry, and then
began personally approaching individual airlines, airports and airport vendors
one by one. The initial concept he began shopping was wrapping commercial
airplanes with ads. The first day he began his research, he located a potential
partner in Las Vegas. Before that day was over, a partnership was formed
with Allegiant Air, giving Mr. Stoddard the right to sell the exterior of their
aircraft to advertisers.
Within three months, Mr. Stoddard had executed
InterAir Media’s first deal to the tune of half a million dollars, and knew
immediately his intuition had been right. He folded his existing agency and
officially started InterAir Media with Eric Neff, who is InterAir Media’s
National Accounts Manager. The company that Mr. Stoddard shuttered was Ciao
Advertising, which was based in Miami and opened in 2002. Ciao was a
full-service ad agency with clients that included The Delano Hotel, Raleigh
Hotel, China Grill, Tsunami restaurant, and others. Prior to that, he
established his own consulting firm with one of the founders of Virtual Access
Networks, a dot.com startup he’d worked at as Creative Director in 2000. As a
consultant, Mr. Stoddard offered branding, creative strategy, and advertising
consulting, and worked with such companies as 15 Group, a real estate
investment firm in Miami, System 7, a smart-home technology provider and other
boutique clients.
Mr. Stoddard graduated from Clark University in
Worcester, Massachusetts, in 2001 with a degree in Computer Science. He is a
1997 alumnus of the country’s oldest boarding school -- Governor’s Academy in
Byfield, Massachusetts.
Drew Stoddard’s non-airline-related hobbies include
fly fishing, skeet and trap shooting, snowboarding and collecting classic
Italian cars. In 2008, he married a woman he met in the seventh grade whom he
ran into on the street in Miami five years ago. Mrs. Stoddard is a custom
handbag and jewelry designer and the owner of Bunny & Chad, Inc. They reside
in West Palm Beach.
For entertaining advice join hosts Ray Schilens and Brad Forsythe for a lively and informative discussion.
10-Jul-09 9:00 AM
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