Belinda Archer sees Stella David’s passion for brands shine brightly at
West Bay
Stella David, the marketing director of the drinks group, West Bay
Distributors, is bright, breezy and bubbly - much like several products
within her brand portfolio, which ranges from Asti Spumante to Bacardi
and Martini.
The 33-year-old is enthusiastic about her job, which she moved into
three months ago from being marketing controller for the Bacardi brands.
In her former role, she re-energised Bacardi’s advertising, launched the
Breezer spin-offs and was instrumental in extending the agency roster
beyond McCann-Erickson, bringing in Mustoe Merriman Henry Levy on
Bacardi Spice, Howell Henry Chaldecott Lury for Martini and the HHCL
Brasserie to work on the schnapps-based drink, Metz.
Her next mission is to build on the Brasserie’s successful launch of
Metz by allocating a dramatically increased budget and rehiring it to
work on the next raft of advertising (Campaign, 6 December).
David believes her strength is her passion for her products. ‘I began at
Golden Wonder, where I worked on Pot Noodle, which I was passionate
about. Now I’m passionate about Bacardi. You’ve got to be, to be a good
marketer.’
David hails from North Yorkshire. She did a degree in engineering at
Cambridge and her early career was spent as an engineer at Thorn EMI. ‘I
can’t put my finger on why I entered marketing, but it is much more
enjoyable,’ she concedes. David says her engineering background was not
an inappropriate training for marketing. She is surrounded by business
studies people, historians, chemists and other engineers. ‘It doesn’t
matter about your background - you’ve just got to have the right
personality, drive, passion and interest in brands,’ she says, revealing
that her other interests embrace skiing and a bit of drinking (‘Bacardi
and orange juice, naturally,’ she confesses).
‘The company believes in people having a life outside work. We all come
to work to have a good time,’ she says, cheerily, though you can imagine
her working hard and being a demanding, no-nonsense sort of client.
