How Molson Coors’ new CMO will approach the job

Sofia Colucci, who begins today as the new chief marketing officer for Molson Coors, brings a passion for creativity and a strong sales focus to her new role. Most recently the global VP for the Miller family of brands and the company’s economy portfolio, Colucci is credited inside the company for the resurgence of Miller Lite, which has grown total U.S. category share in a difficult market for mainstream beer brands. Colucci succeeds Michelle St. Jacques, who was appointed to a new role as chief commercial officer. “We’ve seen a transformation over the last number of years in terms of how we approach our brands, how we bring a strong point of view, how we’re doing things that are culturally relevant,” Colucci said in an interview. “And what we’re going to do is focus on amplifying that. I think we’ve created something really special with Miller Lite. And so you can expect that we're going to take that across to all of our brands in the Molson Coors portfolio.” Colucci has fans in the agency community as well. “Sofia’s intelligence is only outmatched by her ambition,” said Ari Weiss, global chief creative officer at DDB, in emailed comments. “Her love of brands and the creativity that makes them revered is unparalleled. We have done some of the best work in the world with Sofia and I can’t wait to see what she’s able to accomplish with the rest of the Molson Coors portfolio.” Below, more on how Colucci views marketing and what approach she will bring to the job. This interview has been lightly edited for length and clarity. Brands on the rise A look at up-and-coming brands disrupting their categories Read more here What’s the first thing you're going do in your new role? There's a lot of texts, a lot of emails to get through. But I think it’s cracking open a Miller High Life and celebrating with my family. How did you get here? I think my background plays a big role in how I approach marketing. I’ve been fortunate to work at three major companies in my career in Canada and the U.S. for nearly 20 years. I'm Canadian-Uruguayan. You can probably hear a little bit of my Canadian accent, but I also bring a Latino point of view to having been raised originally in Uruguay. But I worked in three big companies starting at a Canadian food company called Maple Leaf Foods, then PepsiCo for about eight years, and now Molson Coors. I’ve been really fortunate because I’ve gotten a lot of very diverse and well-rounded experiences. [I had] the traditional brand management with a commercial focus, especially at Maple Leaf foods, [and] brand-building strategy that I learned a lot of at PepsiCo. At Molson Coors, I led innovation, all the way from the white space innovation to the actual commercialization and launches [of] products like Blue Moon Light Sky and Vizzy. The last number of years I’ve done more of the traditional marketing with a brand like Miller Lite, where you go really deep in the brand building. I feel like you want to have a CMO who has diverse experiences, who can think about brand building, as well as the business management side of things. And so I’ve been really fortunate to get those. Your competition is on record saying that the mainstream brands are declining. Would you agree? And if not, what do brands such as Coors Light and Miller Lite need to do to grow? Yeah, I absolutely disagree with that. I mean, if you look at Miller Lite, it’s been growing, and actually been the healthiest it’s been in years. And it’s not growing just in the premium light segment, it's actually growing share in the total beer category. So it’s in a really healthy space. And if I think about the way we got there, I go back to just the experiences that I had, it’s given me an appreciation of approaching opportunities in both the short and long term, as well as balancing passion with pragmatism. What I mean by that is I’m obsessed with creativity, and really believe it’s the secret sauce to building long-term brand growth. Brands need to have a point of view and show up in culturally relevant ways. But I’m equally obsessed with driving results. And I recognize that there are multiple levers that will impact how a brand performs. So it’s just as important to build a campaign that is really culturally relevant with a lot of voltage, as it is building a laser-focused, smart sales approach. And that's the approach that we took with Miller Lite the last number of years. We've built a clear point of view with our “Tastes Like Miller Time” global platform, and we’ve launched culturally relevant brand acts [such as] Shoezies and beer drops. And it’s all about keeping our pulse on what’s happening in culture, but really staying true to our brand. We’ve also made our brand more inclusive by bringing more beer lovers in. From our “Open and Proud” platform for the LGBTQ+ community to our Latino efforts with J Balvin. And some really amazing work to be more inclusive with women that you’re going to be seeing next week. [International Women's Day is March 8. She declined to elaborate on what the brewer has planned.] We've done all of this by being really hyper-focused on ensuring that our platform works all the way down to the point of purchase. And has actually led to the success of Miller Lite. I think the other thing is, our work can only succeed with a strong and motivated team in place. So you know, and I know a lot of companies have these, but our number one value at Molson Coors, is to put people first. And so I personally make an effort to practice that mindset every day and uphold a culture of inclusivity and collaboration. Ad Age events Sign up for events and awards Learn more here What will we see from Molson Coors marketing that might be different from your predecessor? My predecessor is still working side-by-side with me. I have a really great relationship with MSJ [Michelle St. Jacques], and we share a lot of the same beliefs, but I'll definitely be bringing in my approach as well. My goal is to take the special sauce we’ve mastered on Miller Lite, along with the broader learnings I’ve gathered in my career so far, and amplify all of it to take our collective Molson Coors brands to the next level. There are really three things that I’m focusing on. One is balancing breakthrough creative with a smart commercial approach to drive those tangible short- and long-term results. The second is building truly inclusive brands. And that’s not just to be good corporate citizens, because we actually deeply believe that’s what’s going to drive growth. And then the third thing is being the best possible client for agency partners. So, find the risky ideas that we’ve been doing with Miller Lite, but also more importantly, create a collaborative culture that allows us along with our agency partners to do the best work of our careers. Will some of Molson Coors' newer brands fall under your purview? As innovation brands come in, my team will have responsibility for them. So it’s the big brands like Coors Light, Miller Lite, Blue Moon, the economy portfolio—like High Life and Keystone Light—which I already had in my portfolio, and then brands like our above premium Blue Moon and Peroni, as well as our flavor brands like Topo Chico, Vizzy and Simply Spiked. It’s a diverse and wonderful portfolio. Marketing a brand like Miller Lite is certainly going to be different than a smaller, newer brand and you have to take different approaches. I fortunately had those experiences in my career and I'm excited to be able to do that on a bigger scale. What’s going to keep you up at night? I push and push and push because I absolutely love the work. The thing that scares me is a feeling that we’re not putting our absolute best work out there. And so, the best way to solve those insomnia problems I’ve found is to just attack them and figure out what are the things that are worrying me and build a solution and a plan of attack to get to it, which is what our team is going to do. I’ve already started to think about the master plan and the strategy of us getting to great creative work across all of our brands.

How Molson Coors’ new CMO will approach the job

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