How Donna Tweeten helped Hy-Vee score with Caitlin Clark and Patrick Mahomes

Donna Tweeten was into Caitlin Clark before it was cool. The superstar basketball player was a sophomore in high school seven years ago when Tweeten, now president of innovative grocery chain Hy-Vee, first came across her on a tip from her teenage son. Both Hy-Vee and Clark call West Des Moines, Iowa, home. When NIL advertising started in 2021, Tweeten insisted that the chain sign Clark. (Hy-Vee similarly signed Patrick Mahomes and Travis Kelce early in their pro careers). Now that Clark’s gone pro, Hy-Vee has extended the deal by three years. “There was no crystal ball large enough to ever imagine what would happen to her,” said Tweeten. “We knew she was going to be a great brand ambassador for us. I didn’t know just how great.” Tweeten has made some big plays herself. The former agency executive in 2022 became the first woman elected president at Hy-Vee, a role that had traditionally gone to the CEO and/or chairman, in an industry long dominated by males. “I set my sights on wanting to become the highest-ranking female in the company,” said Tweeten, who joined the grocer in 2006. “I wanted to be in that position from a decision-making and power standpoint to have other women join, to my right and to my left, at the table in the boardroom.” Most recently, Tweeten oversaw the launch of Hy-Vee RedMedia, a retail media network helping brands target consumers. RedMedia differs from rivals in an approach to service that Tweeten learned in the agency world. “I spent 22-plus years working in ad agencies. I knew how to treat [CPGs] like clients, and I knew that was going to take exceptional service, specifically on the performance measurement side of things," she said. Read about Ad Age’s 2024 Leading Women here What advice would you give your younger self? I would tell little Donna that she needs to not worry about all her insecurities and all of her struggles with self-doubt. Because that level of insecurity and self-doubt was actually the thing that would fuel you. What’s the biggest risk you’ve ever taken? Personally, I never wanted to get married, and I never wanted to have children. And I got married, and I have five kids. So that was very risky for me. Professionally, I never wanted to leave the agency business. I thought it was very risky for me to go work for a corporation. But in terms of projects, or initiatives or acquisitions or anything that I’ve been a part of within Hy-Vee, I just I don’t see them as risks. I always just see it as opportunity. If you weren’t doing your current job, what would you be doing and why? I would be an independent filmmaker and producer. I love storytelling through motion pictures and sound, I love the process of filmmaking. I love the movie experience—the art of it all, as a consumer and as a maker. What should the industry do to encourage more women and people of color into its ranks? It starts with education. And by that, I mean educating about the need and the benefits for inclusiveness and diversity in the workplace. Specifically in boardrooms, you must absolutely have varying perspective, based on someone’s innate or environmental experiences. You have to have that in the decision-making room for the overall health of your organization. I don’t believe that organizations today can be successful in terms of their growth and their financial health unless they have that diverse representation, that diverse opinion, that diverse voice. How will AI impact your job in the future? I think AI will help us in the optimization of campaigns, I think it will help us in exploring lead generation, it will help me specifically when it comes to problem-solving and decision-making, because AI is going to provide a lot more data for you to make a better, more sound decision. At the raw center of creativity—which to me is about collaboration—I don’t think AI will succeed as much as people would like. I think ideation is still best in its human form. Read about Ad Age’s 2024 Leading Women here

How Donna Tweeten helped Hy-Vee score with Caitlin Clark and Patrick Mahomes

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