Stefan Hartung

Title

Co-founder

Company

Ideas That Kick

Matthew Golladay

Title

President

Company

BrightPet Nutrition Group

Planning your business’s future: how goal-customized branding strategies can get you there faster – Stefan Hartung, co-founder of Ideas That Kick, and Matthew Golladay, president of BrightPet Nutrition Group, offer first-hand success stories, goal-oriented strategies and execution tactics to take your business to the next level. Whether you have aggressive growth plans, are working to be acquired or want to create a family legacy, there are different future-focused, marketing and branding strategies you can apply to your business now. Learn how rebranding, package design, marketing efforts and social media strategies are crucial and relevant to meeting your business goals for the future.

Born and raised in Hildesheim, Germany, Hartung studied visual communication there as well as in the US. After four years working in full service agencies in Hamburg, Germany, he moved to the US and, in 2001, co-founded Minneapolis design agency Kick with Mary Kemp, director of strategy. Kick has applied its design thinking to brands such as Blackwood Pet Food, Cargill Pet Treats, Oxbow Animal Health, Johnson & Johnson, PepsiCo and Mom Brands breakfast cereals. Hartung coordinates Kick’s DExI (Design Exchange International) program and serves on the advisory board of his US alma mater, University of Wisconsin Stout.

Golladay grew up around a small-town Ohio feed mill and later the startup of family-owned Ohio Pet Foods, which specializes in co-packing premium and superpremium dry pet foods. He earned a bachelor’s degree in accounting from Kent State University and previously worked in corporate finance at HSBC Bank and GMAC Finance, as well as commercial sales. Golladay returned to the family business to manage the buyout of Blackwood Pet Food, then partnered with Ideas that Kick to transform the nearly 20-year-old brand. In 2016, he oversaw the partnering of Blackwood, Adirondack and Makin’ Trax pet food brands, along with Ohio Pet Foods and Southern Tier Pet Nutrition, with private investment firm Graham Partners to create BrightPet.