A conversation with Allison Stransky and Jamie Gersch
When a global tech giant and a sustainability-focused footwear company sit down to compare marketing strategies, the result is a fascinating exploration of how modern brands balance purpose with precision. Allison Stransky, CMO of Samsung Electronics America, and Jamie Gersch, CMO of Rothy’s, recently joined Marketers That Matter® to discuss how they’re building emotionally resonant brands while leveraging data and personalization to scale relevance.
At Samsung, Stransky oversees corporate marketing for a brand with 97% awareness, with 76% of U.S. households owning at least one Samsung product and one in four owning three or more. Her unique remit includes Samsung’s first-party data strategy, cross-product campaigns, and the Connected Experiences Center —Samsung’s center of excellence for connectivity—which focuses on bringing the smart home ecosystem to life through the seamless integration of products and services. Before joining Samsung, she spent five-plus years at Google working on creative effectiveness research for YouTube. She previously worked at global powerhouses including L’Oréal, Unilever, and Johnson & Johnson.
Gersch leads marketing for Rothy’s, the sustainable footwear brand that transforms recycled plastic bottles into stylish shoes and has kept 200 million bottles out of landfills. Since joining from Old Navy, she’s overseen Rothy’s expansion from a D2C e-commerce business to a multi-channel brand with 29 stores and partnerships with major retailers like Nordstrom, Liberty in London, and Amazon. Her unique role combines both marketing and e-commerce functions as the company grew from two shoe styles to more than 40 plus the addition of other product categories like handbags
Together, Stransky and Gersch offer insights into how purpose-driven marketing, data personalization, and strategic channel expansion are shaping the future of brand building.
In this insightful conversation, Gersch and Stransky discuss how Rothy’s and Samsung are building purpose in their brands, consistency and innovation, channel strategies and partnership, and more.
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How do you define and build purpose in your brands?
Jamie Gersch: At Rothy’s, we started with a deep belief that there was a unique reason why Rothy’s should exist. That is how I think about the heart of a brand’s purpose – understanding why we exist that’s different from others in the market, outside of what we sell. When I think about Rothy’s, our product is sustainable, stylish, and comfortable, but a lot of people can make stylish and comfortable shoes. What I love about Rothy’s is that the emotional connection is built into the product itself, and it’s at the root of everything we do internally and externally.
Allison Stransky: At Samsung, we think about tech as more than just gadgets — it’s about creating meaningful experiences that truly improve your life. What is really special to us is we’re in so many different categories and so many different places. The products themselves are incredible. You now carry a better camera in your pocket than most non-professional photographers owned in their lifetime. But, beyond cutting edge features, there’s a lot more that we can offer. We’re really thinking about our purpose — enhancing your life — as bringing those higher order benefits to life. For example, a phone is no longer just a phone, it is a health tracking device because your phone connects to your wearables and tells you how you are sleeping, your heart rate, how much physical activity you are doing, and now makes recommendations to improve your health and well-being.
What are some specific brand initiatives you’re working on?
Jamie Gersch: Our shoes are crafted out of recycled bottles, and we have kept 200 million bottles out of landfill to date. We’re so proud of that. We started this campaign when we launched our Fifth Avenue store last year, and we invited customers in for a bottle swap. We partnered with Hydro Flask and FloWater to provide access to water on the streets of New York. We said, “Bring us a used single-use bottle, and we will recycle it and give you a Hydro Flask that you can fill up again.” That was driven by an insight that our team found: In New York alone, there’s 1.3 billion plastic bottles that go into landfill every year. Every time we’ve done these events, there are lines starting at 5 a.m. outside our stores. People go crazy for it because consumers want to engage in an action they feel passionate about.
Allison Stransky: We just released the next evolution of our consumer campaign called “Your Home Speaks You.” Built on the insight that everyone’s needs, interests, and routines are all so unique, this is our first-ever national campaign to bring together multiple products across categories—powered by SmartThings and Galaxy AI—into one story. It’s a shift from focusing solely on product features to showing how our connected ecosystem learns from you, adapts to you, and enhances your everyday life in simple, personal ways.
How do you balance brand consistency with experimentation and innovation?
Allison Stransky: We have strong brand governance and a design team that ensures consistency, but we also rely on our strategy and asking the right questions about brand fit. Take our current partnership with Ashley Furniture, for example. Initially, the reaction was a bit like “Furniture stores? What do we know about furniture stores?” But through our process, we found a way to authentically bring our brands together. There are style guides, there’s governance, and we never move forward if something doesn’t feel right. But when the opportunity aligns and the story makes sense, that’s when innovation and consistency can really come together.
Jamie Gersch: The clog is a perfect example. We are known for comfortable, stylish, sustainable shoes, mostly designed for versatile, to-and-from-work occasions. But we found influencers and people on social media were going to and from their Pilates and yoga classes in our clogs. We thought, “Wow, we’ve never seen this type of end use; maybe we need to lean into positioning the clog at the center of this different activity.” It’s a test-and-learn strategy because it is a new way in for us. We’ve traditionally been part of the fashion community, not the fitness space, and this product has unlocked both the fitness side and the fashion side.
How are you approaching channel strategy and partnerships?
Jamie Gersch: Until last year we were an owned channel-only retailer – we sold exclusively through our e-commerce site and our own stores. Then we went out and talked to consumers, and we heard that access was the main barrier. They wanted to shop us where they shop for everything else. So, we made the conscious decision to expand into Amazon, Nordstrom, Anthropologie. We also expanded internationally into Liberty in London and Le Bon Marché in Paris. What’s been -important as we’ve expanded is making sure that we’re not just shoes on a table or product on a site. We work closely with our partners to tell the full brand story. In stores, we have fixtures made of 3D bottles that highlight our milestone of 200 million bottles saved from landfills. It’s access with intention – making sure our story is told clearly, consistently, and in a way that reflects who we are.
Allison Stransky: We were created before there was the world of DTC. The vast majority of our sales still happen through brick-and-mortar retail channels. Most of our mobile sales go through the carriers, Best Buy is our top retailer for TVs, and we sell a lot of appliances through Lowe’s and Home Depot. Our approach is always consumer-first: How can we meet you where you want to shop and make it easy to convert wherever you feel most comfortable? Ashley Furniture is a new take on retail for us—furniture stores are a different environment. But Ashley shares our connected home vision, and the belief that products should deliver more than their basic functions. For example, the bedroom is a space for health and wellness, while the living room provides an entertainment experience to enjoy with family and friends.
How are you using data to create personalized customer experiences?
Jamie Gersch: One of the great advantages of Rothy’s starting as a DTC business is that we own all of our customer data – especially first-party data. We’ve gotten much smarter about using it to support the customer through their journey in the most effective way possible. That’s been the biggest unlock for us – the ability to personalize the journey and the experience across channels. We started with just The Point and The Flat shoe, and today we’ve expanded to 40-plus styles. That breadth has unlocked the ability to cross-sell and we’re focused on making sure that every touchpoint feels as personal and relevant as possible. Our goal is to bring you back for a second purchase within 60 days, and we are laser-focused on making that happen.
Allison Stransky: We have a lot of data. Our goal has been personalization, and we’re now moving into an era that we’re calling hyper-personalization. We have reached the tipping point with AI tools where we have the ability to get much more customized insights, making traditional mass marketing no longer sufficient. We’ve already segmented and built personas, and understand consumer interests. But now, with hyper-personalization, we’re layering on different data signals to go deeper. With insights from Samsung Health, Samsung TV Plus and SmartThings, we’re able to build a more complete picture of our consumer, because people want to engage relevantly.
What career advice would you give based on your own pivots and learnings?
Jamie Gersch: Don’t pigeonhole yourself into any one thing. The benefit of having 20 years of Gap and Old Navy experience was it offered me the ability to do so many different facets under marketing and understand so many different areas. I started before e-commerce was a thing, worked on traditional stores, did global advertising, packaging and media, brand building, and then learned the financial side of the business. Being able to do all those things and then pick the brand that I wanted to go to offered me that opportunity. What I learned about myself moving to Rothy’s was what really drove me was being connected to a purpose-based brand.
Allison Stransky: The biggest change for me was going from L’Oréal to Google. That’s not just because the companies are so different, but because the role was a complete 180. I went from brand marketing to focusing on measuring creative effectiveness on YouTube. L’Oréal was fast, Google was even faster. Every day was a proverbial “fly the plane while building it” situation. I came to realize that the ways of working that I developed were actually more valuable than the specific work that I was doing. Each company has such a different way of working, and learning to adapt to each type of environment was an important learning experience. Now, I understand that I’ll encounter plenty of unknowns, but I know how to quickly figure out what I need to know and do.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
Interview by Kathy Hollenhorst, Marketers That Matter® Advisor & Chief Community Officer
About the Visionaries
Allison Stransky, CMO of Samsung Electronics America
Allison Stransky is a seasoned marketing executive who has led brand and business growth at some of the world’s most respected companies, including Samsung, Google, L’Oreal, Unilever and Johnson & Johnson.
Allison is currently the Chief Marketing Officer at Samsung Electronics America where she drives the strategy behind Samsung’s connected ecosystem, AI-powered experiences, sustainability efforts, and commitment to accessibility and citizenship/STEM education—bringing the company’s “One Samsung: Better Together and Enhanced by AI” vision to life.
Allison serves on the Board of Trustees for Helen Keller Services, a national nonprofit dedicated to improving the lives of blind and deaf individuals. She holds a master’s degree from the Fashion Institute of Technology and a bachelor’s degree from Bucknell University.
Jamie Gersch CMO of Rothy’s
As the Chief Marketing Officer at Rothy’s, Jamie Gersch oversees global brand marketing and eCommerce strategies to expand Rothy’s community of millions of loyal customers. Joining Rothy’s in December 2022, Jamie is renowned for crafting purpose-driven campaigns that enhance brand equity and relevance, aligned with Rothy’s vision to create a more sustainable and stylish future.
Before joining Rothy’s, Jamie led Old Navy’s global marketing team, fostering brand love through a democratic approach to style for the entire family. Personally dedicated to ensuring all marketing elements reflect the brand’s true essence and emotionally resonate with consumers, Jamie is a recognized industry leader, named as one of the top 50 CMOs by Forbes CMO Next.
She graduated Cum Laude from Colgate University with a BA in Sociology. Jamie serves on the board of Boys & Girls Clubs of America and Ometria, a retail technology company. She resides in Marin County with her husband Jordan and their three children: Sam, Noah, and Abby.
Visionaries airs live on Zoom every month and is brought to you in partnership with The Wall Street Journal. In each episode, two new Visionaries share their game plan and how that impacts today’s teams, talent, and you.
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