Katie Elder had already accomplished more in marketing in a span of eight years with Procter & Gamble than some hope to achieve in an entire career.
Elder has worked across multiple brands in various roles and on projects ranging from national marketing plans to regional portfolio management and global product design in Asia.
Since joining the Toronto-based consumer packaged goods company as an assistant brand manager in 2006, Elder has developed campaigns that have helped drive revenue and market share for the Cascade, Dawn, Ivory and Febreze brands both in Canada and abroad.
In 2010, Elder relocated to Singapore on an expatriate assignment to lead the integration of the Ambi Pur business (which P&G had recently purchased from Sara Lee). She led the marketing and media plans across 11 countries in Asia Pacific. The integration was considered the most successful in P&G history with shipments growing 40% within 12 months after the acquisition of the brand was complete.
While still in Singapore, Elder was promoted to global design brand manager on the Ambi Pur and Febreze business and tasked with, among other things, product development and launches for both existing and potential markets.
“One of the biggest takeaways that I always had when I was doing in-home qualitative research in different places… is that at the end of the day people have more in common than we often think,” says Elder. “It’s how you bring those insights and common needs that people have to life in a locally relevant way that make all the difference.”
When Elder returned to Canada in 2012, she wanted to work closely with a retailer to understand how activations could best be executed at store level and the role that P&G needed to play.
Today, as the leader of the shopper marketing team for the P&G portfolio at Walmart Canada, Elder is responsible for creating customized marketing plans on all top-priority product launches at the retailer.
To drive awareness of its revamped Pampers line of diapers, Elder lead a multi-agency team on the development of an exclusive program for Walmart that targeted new moms and included social, digital, print, a pre-natal sampling program and in-store marketing materials focusing on product innovation.
The campaign, which launched October 2013, rewarded 250 new moms from across Canada that interacted with the brand on social media with diapers and other P&G products like detergent.
One of Elder’s proudest accomplishments at P&G so far is her work on the Clean Water partnership program. For every participating P&G product purchased at Walmart in-store or online from Aug. 1 to March 31, 2015, the company will donate 1 day of clean drinking water to the Children’s Safe Drinking Water Fund.
Adapted from the U.K., Elder was charged with bringing the program in Canada. Recent numbers show that P&G has helped donate over 14.5 million days of clean water.
And if Elder weren’t busy enough, she is currently earning her masters in sustainability leadership from Cambridge University. Elder says she has always been interested in learning how to incorporate sustainability into her current role rather than treat it as a separate business function. She believes this program will provide her with the tools to do so. Given all she has accomplished so far, it won’t be long until Elder adds this skill to an already impressive list of career achievements.
Meet the rest of the 30 Under 30 for 2014
