Moe’s Southwest Grill appointed its first-ever chief marketing officer this week.
After serving as the fast-casual chain's vice president of marketing for a year and a half, Paul Macaluso was named chief marketing officer, effective immediately. In the newly created role, he is responsible for overseeing marketing and public relations functions, as well as catering and creative services.
“By leveraging his restaurant experience and consumer insights knowledge, he has strengthened our brand positioning, identified key growth drivers and developed his team, leading the brand to significant increases in our comp sales,” said Moe’s president Paul Damico in a statement. In his new role, Macaluso continues to report directly to Damico.
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In addition to his experience at Moe’s, Macaluso previously served as director of product marketing at Burger King Corp., and as vice president of daypart and product marketing for Sonic Corp.
“Moe’s is a young, growing brand that has a lot of passion for its food, customers and its people,” Macaluso said in a statement. “I’m really fortunate to be a part of this brand during a time when the team is working hard to reach milestones.”
In a recent interview with Nation’s Restaurant News, Damico said the fast-causal chain plans to launch its first national television campaign this year. As chief marketing officer, Macaluso is tasked with working alongside Moe’s franchisees to grow the company’s national media presence during the next five years, the company said in a statement.
“Moe’s is nearing our 500th restaurant and is opening a new one every five to six days…we’re not slowing down,” said Karlie Lahm, director of public relations and communications at Moe’s, in an email. “With the growth this company is seeing, we need a leader like Paul [Macaluso] in that role to grow the marketing team and expand their skills sets, all while continuing to provide stellar support to our growing franchise community.”
Moe’s, whose parent company is Atlanta-based Focus Brands Inc., has more than 480 locations systemwide.
Contact Erin Dostal at [email protected].
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