2008 Woodie Awards
Director of marketing and sales brings stars to URI Ryan Center
Lindsay Lorenz
Issue date: 2/29/08 Section: News
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Russo, a bubbly brunette, works with promoters to attract people to the Ryan Center performances and events.
Russo came to the Ryan Center after spending three years at the Dunkin Donuts Center in Providence. She's been at URI for more than eight years now.
Russo works for Global Spectrum, the company that manages the Ryan Center, and said she enjoys her job. "It's never boring," she said.
And it certainly keeps her busy.
The cheerful marketing director has stacks of invoices and event information lining her desk, and her walls are bedecked with dozens of posters from previous events that the venue hosted.
"It looks bad, but it's not," she said, laughing. " I know where everything is."
Speaking of posters, it's Russo who is responsible for designing the posters and distributing them around the area, on and off campus. "There's a lot of day-to-day stuff like putting up posters," she explained. "But then there's also working events."
For Russo, working events can be exciting. They give her the opportunity to learn things about celebrities. "John Mayer spent the whole day on the Internet when he was here," she said. Russo also mentioned that Bob Dylan, who has come to URI three times, brings his own chef instead of using Dining Services. Comedian Bill Cosby needed to have three types of thin crust pizza, she said.
During the year, Kara said she's definitely picked up some interesting tidbits about people who have come to the Ryan Center.
But aside from rubbing elbows with celebs, she does everything from writing press releases, group sales, Internet marketing and all kinds of advertising, which expands far beyond posters.
Russo also puts together speeches for radio and television ads. She said she sometimes has to fit her message into a certain time length.
Russo often sits in her office with a timer and rehearses her messages. She said she sometimes gets raised eyebrows from co-workers because of it. Once the ads are finished, she tunes into the radio or television to make sure everything sounds good.