Vice President of Marketing

Job Title: Vice President, Marketing — Star Brands North America

Location: Vernon Hills, IL

Department: Star Brands / Marketing

Reports To: Executive Leadership

JOB PURPOSE:

The Vice President, Marketing — Star Brands North America is responsible for leading the Star Brands strategic platform and building the brand, portfolio, commercial, and demand-generation capabilities required to scale Star Brands into a stronger, more focused, and more profitable consumer packaged goods business. This role leads the development and execution of North America marketing strategy across brand positioning, portfolio architecture, innovation strategy, go-to-market planning, omnichannel demand generation, pricing and promotional strategy, and portfolio simplification for Mean Green, Moldex, Concrobium, Krud Kutter, and Rust-Oleum Whink, while partnering closely with the global The Pink Stuff team to commercialize The Pink Stuff plans in North America.

This leader will operate as a senior marketing business partner, working closely with Sales, Operations, R&D, Regulatory, Legal, Supply Chain, Finance, external insights partners, and agency partners to translate consumer and category insights into commercially grounded growth plans. The role requires a modern CPG marketing leader with deep cleaners category experience who can steward brands, build mental and physical availability, improve portfolio productivity, lead digital-first growth, strengthen retailer execution, and create measurable business impact through disciplined marketing strategy, execution, and performance management.

KEY RESPONSIBILITIES

• Marketing platform strategy and business leadership
• Lead the Star Brands strategic platform for North America Marketing, with accountability for portfolio priorities, innovation direction, demand generation, and commercial marketing plans that support profitable growth, while ensuring brand strategy work is aligned to established equity guardrails and global direction where applicable.
• Design and execute marketing-led strategic initiatives across go-to-market, brand and value proposition, demand generation, pricing, promotion, shopper activation, eCommerce, and launch readiness in close partnership with Sales and Operations.
• Use consumer, category, financial, retailer, and operational inputs to make disciplined marketing trade-offs, allocate resources, and improve the quality and speed of decisions affecting brand growth and portfolio performance.
• Brand, portfolio, and consumer growth strategy
• Steward North America marketing strategy, positioning, messaging, portfolio architecture, and value propositions across the Star Brands portfolio, ensuring each brand is activated with a clear role, differentiated consumer promise, and commercially viable growth roadmap, while aligning to global equity, positioning guardrails, and brand direction where applicable.
• Partner closely with the global The Pink Stuff team to ensure North America commercial plans, retailer activation, demand-generation programs, and executional priorities are aligned with the brand’s established equity, guidelines, innovation priorities, and strategic direction.
• Work with the Global Brand Council to align on brand equity principles, positioning guardrails, distinctive assets, portfolio direction, and commercialization priorities, ensuring North America execution reflects the right balance of global consistency and local market growth needs.
• Partner with internal and external insights resources to apply Ehrenberg-Bass Institute principles and research methodologies, including category entry points, mental availability, physical availability, distinctive brand assets, and buyer-behavior learning, to sharpen growth strategy, improve brand activation, and guide commercially grounded marketing decisions.
• Build evidence-based marketing capability by embedding proven brand-growth principles, testing discipline, and decision frameworks that improve consistency, learning, and scale across the organization.
• Omnichannel demand generation and eCommerce acceleration
• Develop integrated marketing plans across paid, owned, earned, retail, shopper, social, creator, eCommerce, and in-store touchpoints to drive awareness, household penetration, conversion, velocity, and repeat purchase.
• Scale eCommerce conversion through an Amazon-first PDP, and A+ content optimization engine, AI-enabled test-and-learn, search and content performance management, and a disciplined refresh cadence across priority retailers.
• Partner with Sales and retailer teams to translate marketing strategy and brand priorities into persuasive selling stories, line review support, channel activation plans, and customer-specific growth programs.
• Innovation, commercialization, and launch readiness
• Lead innovation strategy and commercialization in partnership with R&D, Regulatory, Legal, Sales, and Operations, ensuring new products are insight-led, differentiated, compliant, operationally feasible, and launch-ready.
• Strengthen launch planning through clear positioning, packaging strategy, claims substantiation, channel priorities, sales materials, demand creation plans, and post-launch performance tracking.
• Reduce regulatory and reputational exposure by leading packaging, compliance, and claims workstreams that support responsible, credible, and compliant innovation.
• Operational complexity, margin, and portfolio productivity
• Partner closely with Operations and Sales to identify complexity reduction opportunities across SKUs, claims, packaging, components, and supply chain requirements, ensuring marketing and portfolio decisions improve service, cost, margin, and executional focus.
• Support cross-functional assessments of supplier, toller, packaging, and component opportunities by providing the marketing, brand, claims, and portfolio perspective needed to improve profitability without compromising consumer, customer, or brand expectations.
• Build portfolio discipline by reducing non-strategic SKU complexity, consolidating investment behind priority brands, and improving inventory, forecast accuracy, and working capital efficiency.
• People, capability, and operating discipline
• Build and lead a high-performing marketing and platform team with clear goals, accountability, decision rights, and development plans, while creating strong cross-functional alignment with Sales and Operations.
• Institutionalize marketing operating rhythms, project governance, performance dashboards, and disciplined planning processes that improve execution quality, Sales alignment, Operational readiness, and organizational focus.
• Develop talent, raise functional standards, and model a commercially grounded, consumer-led, analytically rigorous approach to brand and business leadership.

QUALIFICATIONS

• Bachelor’s degree in Marketing, Business, Finance, Engineering, or a related field required; MBA or advanced degree preferred.
• 10+ years of progressive marketing, brand management, product management, or commercial leadership experience in consumer-packaged goods at director level or above, with direct cleaners, home care, household cleaning, or adjacent regulated-category experience considered critical.
• Experience leading brands across household cleaning, specialty cleaning, surface care, mold and mildew, degreasers, stain removers, or related cleaners categories are strongly preferred and essential to success in the role;
• Having 2+ years of direct sales experience would be a competitive advantage.
• Proven record leading brand strategy, portfolio architecture, innovation, commercialization, integrated marketing, shopper activation, and retailer go-to-market plans that drive measurable growth.
• Strong understanding of omnichannel CPG growth, including eCommerce, Amazon, retail media, social, creator/influencer, paid media, content optimization, SEO/search, PDP/A+ content, and retailer digital shelf performance.
• Demonstrated ability to translate consumer insight, syndicated data, segmentation, category dynamics, and financial analysis into clear strategies, investment choices, and persuasive selling stories.
• Experience managing packaging, claims, compliance, sustainability, and regulated-category launch requirements in partnership with Regulatory, Legal, R&D, and Operations.
• Strong commercial and financial acumen, including pricing, promotion, margin management, marketing ROI, budget allocation, SKU productivity, cost reduction, and portfolio profitability.
• Ability to lead cross-functionally without relying solely on formal authority, creating alignment across Sales, Supply Chain, Operations, R&D, Finance, Regulatory, Legal, and agency partners.
• Proven ability to build, coach, and retain high-performing teams while raising functional capability, accountability, and operating rigor.
• Executive presence, strong communication skills, and the ability to simplify complex business issues into clear recommendations, strategic narratives, and action plans.

Salary range is $238,000. - $284,000, bonus eligible

From big benefits to small, we take care of our associates! Rust-Oleum offers 9.5 paid holidays and two floating holiday per year. You are also eligible to earn three weeks of vacation on an annualized basis. After 30 days of employment, you will be eligible for a benefits package that includes medical, dental, life, disability and business travel insurance, flexible spending accounts, EAP, stock purchases. Associates are 100% vested in the RPM Pension plan after completing five years of service. We also offer a 401(k) plan after three months of employment.

Rust-Oleum is an equal opportunity employer. Employment selection and related decisions are made without regard to sex, race, age, disability, religion, national origin, color, or any other protected class