Meet the leaders
Phil Motta
Phil Motta is a marketing communications executive, entrepreneur and consultant who has founded two communications agencies (Phil Motta & Associates and the Motta Company), executed a roll-up to create a significant Los Angeles office for a multi-office independent, integrated marketing services firm (R&R Partners) and was a partner in a large regional multi-office communications firm (EvansGroup) which became a North American unit of a European global holding company (Publicis).
The diverse clientele of agencies he has founded and managed have included Bank of America, TXU Energy, The Howard Hughes Corporation, On the Border Mexican Cantinas, the Arizona Lottery, Boeing Company, the Irvine Company, Del Webb Corp., Norwegian Cruise Lines, Bonita Bay Group, Morton’s Restaurant Group, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences and others.
In addition to marketing agency experience, Motta founded three organizations involved in communications, consulting, policy development and business strategy. These included Motta Ventures, a consulting and small venture capital group; Ovation Broadcasting, a commercial radio station acquisition, management and turnaround venture; and Motta Laybourne Johnson, a marketing, finance and management consulting practice, counting GE Capital, Insight Enterprises, Inc., and the Fiesta Bowl, among others, as clientele.
Motta has served on several national boards and committees of the American Association of Advertising Agencies, including its Western Board, Government Relations Committee, New Business Committee and Interactive Media and New Technologies Committee. In his industry roles, Motta has presided over union contract negotiating committees and advocacy panels on behalf of clients and agencies.
Active in professional, public and community affairs, Motta has been president of the Fiesta Bowl and its team selection committee and is a life director of the Bowl. He played a role in initiating Sunkist’s sponsorship of the Fiesta Bowl (the first large-scale intercollegiate event to secure a title sponsor) and, subsequently, Frito-Lay’s sponsorship of what is now the Tostitos Fiesta Bowl. He was national vice president of the Muscular Dystrophy Association, a member of the Texas Research League, a board member of the Greater Phoenix Convention & Visitors Bureau and a director of the Phoenix Crisis Nursery. He was appointed by the Secretary of the Interior to the Blue Ribbon Panel of Judges for the Take Pride in America Awards. He was a founding director of the Arizona Science Center and a member of the Urban Land Institute.
Andy Hopson
Andy Hopson is a renowned public relations, advocacy and marketing strategy expert. He also founded a consultancy, Real Good Idea, as a resource for entrepreneurs seeking pre-funding business strategies and marketing expertise. A true integrated marketing professional, he has led both advertising and public relations agencies and takes a “technique agnostic” approach to the business.
Hopson has worked on Capitol Hill as press secretary for a Congressman and in Ogilvy’s Houston office on the Shell Oil account. A few years later in Ogilvy’s Seattle office, he helped build one of the first totally integrated agencies in the U.S. Subsequently, he was vice president of marketing at the Seattle Economic Development Council, before joining EvansGroup where as president of its public relations practice his vision helped build a philosophy of integration that propelled it to become a top 20 PR firm in the U.S.
Following EvansGroup’s acquisition by Paris-based holding company Publicis Groupe, Hopson launched and became president of Publicis Dialog in the U.S., a unit that had previously been only in Europe. The firm rapidly became a top ten agency in its segment.
Hopson left Publicis to become president and CEO of Burson-Marsteller’s headquarters New York City office and their Northeast region before serving as managing director of the Ruder Finn Public Relations Chicago office and president of independent advertising agency, Noble, also in Chicago.
Hopson has been a senior business counselor to the C-suites of many important corporations and institutions. His extensive, national and international experience with large and small clients in both B2B and B2C sectors, includes wide-ranging work for Asiana Airlines, Bank of America, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Church & Dwight, Consumer Electronics Association, COUNTRY Financial, United Soybean Board, Duraflame, Gardenburger, Great Northern Annuities, Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE), Nestlé, PETsMART, Potbelly Sandwich Shops, Samsung, Southwest Airlines, Starbucks, T-Mobile, Valassis and Weyerhaeuser, among others.
Driven by a strong sense of commitment to his community, Hopson has worked to win voter approval of school bond elections. He also was an early board member at Make-a-Wish Foundation of America, authoring their first marketing plan and development of their first national PSA campaign. He was a founding board member of the Council of PR Firms. In 1998, he established a marketing communications scholarship at Brigham Young University.
