• by Erik Sass  @eriksass1, September 30, 2015

It would appear that Advertising Week is the ideal time to announce new hires, judging by the spate of high-level executive appointments from publishers and associations during the industry confab.

The MPA – The Association of Magazine Media — revealed that Mary Berner is stepping down after her three-year term as president and CEO of the magazine industry organization ends. Berner is joining Cumulus Media as CEO, taking the reins from Lewis Dickey Jr. Before taking the top spot at the MPA, Berner was CEO of the Reader’s Digest Association.

The Time Out Group (TOG) announced the promotion of Noel Penzer to CEO of the company, while Julio Bruno has been appointed executive chairman. Penzer previously served as president of TOG, after joining the company as managing director for TOG’s Europe operations. Bruno most recently served as global vice president of sales at TripAdvisor, where he was responsible for leading the global expansion of its business listings; before that he also held senior executive roles at Travelport, Regus and Diageo.

TOG recently completed the transition of its core print magazines to free magazines in top markets including London, New York, and Chicago. It has also introduced a number of new native ad products and an in-venue mobile payment service in partnership with Skypay.

Also this week, AccuWeather announced the appointment of Karen Bressner as head of digital advertising sales, reporting to CRO Marie Svet. Bressner previously oversaw partnership sales for mobile apps for The Topps Corporation, and before that held ad sales leadership positions at RevShare, TiVo, and MTV Networks.

Purch, a publisher combining online content and commerce, announced that Catherine Levene, the co-founder and CEO of Artspace.com, was joining Purch’s board of directors; the appointment will allow Levene to advise on strategy for e-commerce in the art category. Purch also announced that Karen Greenstein has been appointed as general counsel; she previously served as senior vice-president of business and legal affairs at Viacom International.