PPB September 2018

26 | SEPTEMBER 2018 | INNOVATE 2018 Woman o f Ach i evemen t Ma r y E l l en Soka l sk i , MAS M ary Ellen Sokalski, MAS, began her acceptance speech for the 2018 PPAI Woman of Achievement award at the PPAI Women’s Leadership Conference in June by announcing, “THAT was worth wrangling into my Spanx for!” Renowned for her rollicking sense of humor and disarming warmth, Sokalski shocked no one and delighted everyone with her witty opening. Sokalski has been spreading unabashed enthusiasm for promotional products for 37 years. Her career began as a copywriter at the Advertising Specialty Institute (ASI), where she first learned about the industry. Over the course of her tenure there, she was promoted to promotion manager and then to marketing director. Having previously earned her degree in communications and advertising at Temple University, Sokalski was thrilled to be immersed in themarketing field. “I learned what both suppliers and distributors needed to run their businesses andmarket their products, and I was like a sponge, loving all the creativity and vibrant personalities,” she says. “I also learned that I was in an industrymarketing to companies who sold marketing tools, but they weren’t necessarily trained marketers themselves … they were salespeople or business owners.” Supplier Bodek and Rhodes recruited her into the apparel world in 1997 where, as the director of marketing and communications, she helped grow the company 500 percent from a blanks wholesaler serving primarily decorators to the sixth largest promotional products supplier. Sokalski is credited for several boundary-busting promotions for Bodek and Rhodes that resulted in amazing response rates, and in her own personal notoriety as a creative genius. One such promotion was for a new location “right in your backyard,” where she and her teammailed a watermelon—not in a box—to key prospects. The addresses were written directly on the watermelons with a Sharpie, with a message taped to each of them. The campaign had a virtually unheard-of 100 percent response rate. Nominator Julie Heller says, “I remember Mary Ellen presenting ideas to upper management and they would think she was absolutely crazy. She insisted that they let her do her thing, and she was indeed correct.” A promotional products icon, Mary Ellen Sokalski, MAS, is known for her creativity, generosity and legendary hugs. by Terry Ramsay Living By Giving Nominator Cathy Miller, MAS, (right) presents the 2018 Woman of Achievement award to Sokalski.