SEATTLE, May 22 /PRNewswire/ -- Lisa Sharples, a Seattle-based online
marketer and entrepreneur, has been named President of Allrecipes.com, the
leading American online community for home cooks. The appointment,
effective June 4, was announced today by Suzanne M. Grimes, President, Food
& Entertaining, The Reader's Digest Association, Inc., parent company of
Allrecipes.com. Sharples will report to Grimes.
(Photo: http://www.newscom.com/cgi-bin/prnh/20070522/NYTU012)
"I am delighted to appoint Lisa as President of Allrecipes.com. We will
clearly benefit from her impressive leadership skills in sales, marketing,
branding, and business management, particularly in the social networking
space," Grimes said. "Allrecipes.com holds a unique position in the online
marketplace and has a terrific core team. As we celebrate our 10 year
anniversary, Lisa comes to us at just the right time to chart the next
stage of our business development and position us for continued long-term
success."
Sharples joins RDA from Classmates.com, where she had been Senior Vice
President, Marketing since 2005. In this capacity, she helped define the
business strategy of Classmates.com - a leader in online social networking
- while enhancing the key metrics of this profitable business. She led a
sizable team that included marketing, creative execution, customer
retention and customer service. Sharples spearheaded the design and launch
of many new features on the Classmates.com website which fueled the growth
of the business overall in the last two quarters.
In 1995, Sharples co-founded Garden.com, Inc., where she served as
Chief Marketing & Merchandising Officer and a member of the Board of
Directors. As a leader of the online business from concept to project
execution, she is credited with creating the Garden.com business model and
plan that encompassed content, community, merchandising and online retail.
Her other business experience includes overseeing ArtCarved, the
flagship retail jewelry brand at American Achievement Corporation, from
2003 to 2005, and, earlier, working for Silicon Graphics and Standish
Mellon Asset Management.
Sharples holds a Bachelor of Arts from Bowdoin College and a Master of
Management from the J.L. Kellogg Graduate School of Management,
Northwestern University.
Allrecipes.com is the No. 1 online community of home cooks, with 2
million registered members and 5 million unique visitors who typically view
more than 80 million page views each month. During peak months those
metrics reach 10 million "uniques" and 110 million page views.
Allrecipes.com includes 40,000 recipes, all of which are created, tested
and reviewed by participating home cooks. This July the site will celebrate
the 10-year anniversary of its inception in 1997.
Under Grimes's leadership, the Food & Entertaining division leverages
the power of the food and cooking assets of RDA, the world's largest food
publisher. Its properties include, Every Day with Rachael Ray, the Taste of
Home family of books, magazines and web sites and Taste of Home
Entertaining, a home party plan company.
The Reader's Digest Association, Inc. is a global publisher and direct
marketer of books, magazines, music collections and video to customers in
more than 70 countries. In addition to Food & Entertaining, its U.S.
business includes three other divisions organized around consumer affinity
interests - Home & Garden, Health & Wellness and RD Inspiration. The
company publishes 77 magazines, including 50 editions of its flagship,
Reader's Digest, the world's most widely read magazine. The company is
privately held by a group of investors led by Ripplewood Holdings L.L.C.
RDA's headquarters are near Pleasantville, New York.
SOURCE Reader's Digest Association, Inc.
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Related links:
http://allrecipes.com
http://www.rd.com
Photo Notes:
NewsCom: http://www.newscom.com/cgi-bin/prnh/20070522/NYTU012
AP Archive: http://photoarchive.ap.org AP PhotoExpress
Network: PRN1 PRN Photo Desk, photodesk@prnewswire.com
CONTACT:
Ellen Morgenstern of Reader's Digest
Association, Inc., +1-914-244-7582, ellen_morgenstern@rd.com
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