Lopez Negrete Communications adds to Leadership Roster.

Lopez Negrete Communications, Inc. announced the additions of Group Planning Director Gustavo Foldvari and Walmart Executive Group Account Director Luis Vargas to their leadership roster.
 
Foldvari, an inspirational and focused planner with domestic and global experience, joins the agency’s Strategic Planning Unit as group planning director. With more than 15 years of ethnographic experience, he’s an established team leader and catalyst working in international and cross-discipline environments. Foldvari has consistently provided business solutions in branding, new products, cultural trends, shopper insights, social networks, and multicultural ecologies. Prior to joining Lopez Negrete, Foldvari spent close to a decade as EVP Worldwide Mind, Mood and Moments director and international planning director at DraftFCB Worldwide. While at DraftFCB, Foldvari was credited with building a global line and online planning network for five regions – Europe, Asia-Pacific, Latin America, Middle East and South Africa (and Africa through affiliates). All networks were connected through the Global Planning Portal, an online resource that was also fostered and developed under his design and supervision. The planning portal allowed faster response for new business rushes, tapping into the global brain trust and a useful remote collaboration tool.
 
Vargas will serve as executive group account director for the agency’s long-standing retail client, Walmart. His role will consist of providing Walmart’s multicultural team with strategic direction and relevant market and consumer insights as related to their Hispanic strategy. Vargas has a proven track record of delivering results for complex businesses across a broad range of consumer products, industries and geographical regions.

Prior to joining Lopez Negrete Communications, Vargas was director of neighborhood marketing and merchandise for Winn-Dixie Stores. In his role at Winn-Dixie, Vargas utilized extensive quantitative Hispanic consumer research on Hispanic Shopping Trip Behaviors and Drivers to develop overall Hispanic strategy for the chain and recommend Hispanic cluster and sub-clusters definition and criteria for key stores in areas of operation. He developed marketing programs that drove brand equity and determined and recommended to category management teams the right assortment, set sizes, brand mix and origin for each store based on unique neighborhood needs. Vargas also developed recommendations and helped the operations team execute relevant in-store tactics that would considerably improve shopping experiences for the Hispanic consumer. Prior to his role at Winn-Dixie, Vargas was brand development marketing manager at Unilever Foods North America, manager alternate channels marketing/business development at Del Monte Foods, and assistant brand manager at Bayer Corporation.
 
“At Lopez Negrete we have a long-standing commitment to have the best possible talent working, thinking and planning on behalf of our clients. The addition of these two gentlemen is testament to this commitment. Stellar talent has always been the hallmark of our agency,” said Alex López Negrete, president, CEO and chief creative officer of Lopez Negrete Communications. He added: “Gustavo and Luis are highly talented, respected marketing professionals. Both have made enormous contributions to the Hispanic marketing industry and brands they have served. They bring with them strategic prowess, exceptional leadership skills and a deep knowledge of the Latino consumer. We are proud and privileged to have them on our team.”