Kurt Greves Joins as Vice President, Affiliate Advertising, Rainbow Networks
Venture to Increase Local Brand Identity for Rainbow Networks' AMC and WE, While Increasing Ad Revenue for Affiliates
NEW YORK, NY, May 23, 2005 – Rainbow Network Sales announced today the addition of Kurt Greves, Vice President, Affiliate Advertising, further expanding its affiliate infrastructure and creating a new department dedicated to supporting and developing a broad range of local ad sales initiatives. Greves and his staff will be focused specifically on working with MSOs around the country, maximizing local ad sales potential, helping to increase local ad sales revenue for cable affiliates and broadening brand recognition for Rainbow's ad supported networks, AMC and WE.
Today's announcement is one in a series of recent strategic additions, as Rainbow Media continues to expand and centralize its affiliate team, providing greater service to MSOs and ensuring overall efficiency. Greves will report to Todd Green, Senior Vice President of Affiliate Marketing, who oversees the strategic direction and implementation of a broad range of brand related affiliate activities.
"As we look to continue to grow the brands of AMC and WE, we think there is no better investment than maximizing the strength of local ad sales," stated Green. "This is in direct response to our affiliates requests and needs. The expansion of Rainbow's affiliate advertising team underscores the company's commitment to providing added value to its cable partners on a local level and responds to the industry's increased growth of local ad sales initiatives. This new infrastructure will give Rainbow an additional mechanism for local outreach and ensures that we will be able to customize and localize a number of strategic marketing campaigns. Kurt's experience and knowledge of the industry will be a huge asset as we move forward with this initiative."
Kurt Greves and his group will be instrumental in building marketing promotions that deliver AMC and WE's strong brands and unique programming to cable operators and their local clients. The team will also work closely with affiliates to customize promotions, develop strategic marketing and materials, and create opportunities that bring local and national advertisers together in order to help affiliates maximize revenue.
Greves joins Rainbow Media from Comedy Central where he was Vice President, Central/Western Regions & Affiliate Advertising. He was responsible for Affiliate Relations activities for Comedy Central and the Tennis Channel and oversaw strategies, tactics and implementation of Pay Per View and Video on Demand services. Greves managed local marketing promotions and ad sales initiatives while working with several of the network's top affiliates, including Comcast, Time Warner, Charter, Cox and CableOne. He was responsible for creating national extension programming tie-ins with local and national advertisers to increase ad sales revenue. In addition, Greves managed the implementation of customized local ad sales promotions including the Laugh Riots Stand-Up Competition, which generated millions of dollars for cable operators and local ad sales clients across the nation. Prior to Comedy Central, Greves held positions at Cox Media Arizona, Cox Communications and at The Arizona Republic/The Phoenix Gazette, where he began his career. Greves will work at Rainbow from the company's Western Sales Office in Santa Monica, California.
Joining Greves will be Kathy Newberger, who will serve as Director, Affiliate Advertising. Newberger will be based in Rainbow's New York City office and report to Greves. She joined Rainbow in 2001 as a local ad sales manager and was quickly elevated to a regional sales manager. Prior to Rainbow, Kathy worked as an advertising sales manager at Comcast, and previously at AT&T Media Services in a variety of roles including general sales manager and regional marketing director. Kathy began her career at WLIG-TV as an account executive.
About Rainbow Media Holdings LLC
A leader in sports, news and entertainment programming, Rainbow Media Holdings LLC is a subsidiary of Cablevision Systems Corporation. Rainbow owns and manages national networks: AMC, Fuse, IFC (The Independent Film Channel) and WE: Women's Entertainment, as well as Mag Rack, a collection of on-demand video magazines. Rainbow's other businesses include its regional programming services — MetroChannels, News 12 Networks and Rainbow Sports Networks – in addition to the Rainbow Advertising Sales Corporation and Rainbow Network Communications. Rainbow is a 50 percent partner in Fox Sports Net.