• by Steve McClellan  @mp_mcclellan, May 24, 2016

In a bid to help develop the next generation of shopper marketing talent, WPP’s Geometry Global and Michigan State University have teamed to create the school’s first undergraduate shopper marketing course.

Created and taught jointly by members of both organizations, the course, Foundations in Advertising Shopper Marketing and Brand Activation combines face-to-face teaching with remote learning. It is currently available to students at MSU and will roll out globally online to students and industry professionals later in the year.

Carl Hartman, CEO of Geometry Global North America, and Kevin Flagg, Senior Director of Shopper Marketing at Unilever, are credited with brokering the project with MSU. “In an evolved marketing landscape, clients are putting a greater emphasis on shopper marketing as the key to ‘closing a sale’ with shoppers in store or online,” said Hartman.  The partnership with MSU, he added, signifies that Geometry is willing to do its part in helping to train the next generation of shopper marketing talent.

The course consists of 30 online and downloadable sessions, augmented by face-to-face meetings, Skype sessions, online tutorials and a Facebook community page for discussions and submitting and reviewing course work. At the end of the recently completed first semester, students were required to develop presentations in response to a specific brief and pitch them to a team of judges including Unilever’s Flagg, Two winning students will be offered summer internships at Geometry Global’s Chicago office.