Andy Stefanovich | |
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| Occupations | consultant, author, speaker |
| Known for | marketing, speaking |
Andy Stefanovich (born 1966) is an American speaker, bestselling author, and business consultant. [1] [2] A native of Detroit, Michigan, Stefanovich is currently the founding partner of a consulting firm called Life. Previously, he was a partner with Richmond, Virginia-based venture capital firm New Richmond Ventures LLC. [3] [4] Before that, Stefanovich was "chief curator and provocateur" at Prophet, a global business and creative consulting firm headquartered in San Francisco. [5] [6] [7]
Stefanovich graduated from Miami University in Ohio. [1] In 1990, he founded Opus Event Marketing after having worked in the sales department of Ritz-Carlton. [8] The company originally focused on event planning for corporations, but eventually shifted to product development, branding, and positioning; clients included Colgate-Palmolive, American Express, Calvin Klein, Disney, Oscar Mayer and the U.S. Olympic Committee. [1] [9] [10] In 1999, the company was renamed Play, and Stefanovich remained as founder. [11] [12]
Play was acquired in 2009 by Prophet, where Stefanovich was named senior partner. [13] As part of the acquisition, Play's Richmond location became part of the Prophet network of offices. [14] Stefanovich regularly speaks at corporations such as Coca-Cola, Disney, General Electric, and Procter & Gamble. [15]
In 2011, Stefanovich co-founded a venture capital firm called New Richmond Ventures (NRV) with Bob Mooney, Jim Ukrop, and Theodore Chandler Jr. [4] [7] NRV has made early-stage investments in MedCPU, PlanG, and Plugless Power. [16] [17] In addition to NRV, Stefanovich co-founded a second local incubator in 2012 called Men in Shirts that invests in 3 or 4 companies each year in the $50–$150,000 range. Their investments include Richmond-based men's shirtmakers, Ledbury, and a brewery named Ardent Craft Ales. In addition to capital, Stefanovich provides "marketing and strategy advice." [18] In 2013, Stefanovich organized Richmond's first TEDx event—called TEDxRVA. [19]
In 2011, Jossey-Bass, an imprint of Wiley Publishing published Stefanovich's first book Look at More: A Proven Approach to Innovation, Growth, and Change. [20] [21] Look at More was an Inc. bestseller and named one of Ad Age's "Ten Marketing Books You Should Have Read" in 2011. [22] [23] [24]