Betsy HoagBetsy Hoag
Co-Founder, Kairos Consumers

Speaker for: Technology Innovations & Global Business February Breakfast Program

Betsy Hoag accrued more than 10 years of experience in marketing, market research and strategic planning prior to co-founding Kairos Consumers. She began her career in marketing, with the Chicago White Sox. Later, as a consultant with Euromonitor International, she built custom research solutions for global CPG and retailing clients. Industries of expertise included retailing, food and beverage and personal care.

In an account planning role with JWT, Betsy coordinated and then integrated both quantitative and qualitative research with client needs to formulate brand strategy. Working primarily on the Illinois Bureau of Tourism account, she coordinated both domestic and international strategy for initiatives ranging from seasonal advertising campaigns to segmented outreach efforts involving such groups as domestic and Western European Baby Boomers. Though using a combination of consumer research methodologies during this stage of her career, Betsy recognized that opportunities existed to bring the consumer perspective to companies and organizations that traditionally relied only on secondary sources for all research needs. This prompted an entrepreneurial venture with a former Euromonitor colleague, Katerina Makatouni, and Kairos Consumers was thus founded in 2009.

She earned a B.A. from Vanderbilt University and an MBA in International Management from Thunderbird. She is fluent in Spanish.