Abby Spatz has joined New York City & Company as chief marketing officer. She’ll lead the company’s marketing group and will oversee the in-house creative, digital, editorial, photography and video teams. Spatz comes to NYC & Co, from the spa and beauty brand Bliss, where she served as the head of integrated marketing and communications. Prior to that Spatz spent 20-plus years working across a range of marketing functions with global consumer lifestyle brands for several major global ad agencies and entities such as American Express, where she was senior brand manager.
Mufi Hannemann, the former mayor of Honolulu, is returning to the Hawaii Lodging & Tourism Association as president and CEO. He replaces George Szigeti, who was just appointed as president of the Hawaii Tourism Authority. Hannemann had previously served as president, and later, CEO of the association—in 2011 and 2012. Well-known in Hawaiian politics, he served as mayor of Honolulu from 2005 to 2010 and was an unsuccessful candidate for governor in 2014.
Amir Eylon has left his post as vice president of partner engagement for Brand USA to return to Columbus, Ohio and take over as president of the Longwoods USA operation. The company is the globally-known research firm that conducts Longwoods Travel USA®, the largest ongoing survey of American travelers, as well as advertising return on investment research in 12 countries around the globe. Before joining Brand USA in 2012, Eylon had served for five years as state tourism director of Ohio, based in Columbus. Prior to that, he had been executive vice president of the Ohio Hotel & Lodging Association.
Cindy Allen has been named chief marketing officer for American Express Global Business Travel. In this role, Allen will oversee the company’s brand positioning, marketing, product marketing and corporate communications and industry relations functions on a global level. Before joining Amex, Allen served as vice president, Travel Management Company (TMC) Services, at Concur.
Aimie Johnson has been appointed as business development manager for North America Western Region for Kuoni Group Travel Experts. Based in Denver, Colorado, Aimie will be responsible for developing group travel business for the Kuoni Group Travel Experts and Travel Bound brands.
Johnson brings to the position nearly a decade’s sales and marketing experience gained with the Globus family of brands.
Stacey Cohen moves from AlliedTPro, where she last worked in groups, to Travalco as senior market manager for the New York region. She can be reached at Stacey@travalco.com.
Meanwhile, Miami-based Travalco has also hired two group specialists from the Russian Service Bureau, a receptive operator based in Florida that has been decimated by the precipitous decline in Russian inbound business due to effect of the collapse of the ruble as well as economic sanctions put into place by European nations following Russia’s annexation of the Crimea and its later, supporting role in the shooting down on July `7, 2014 of an Air Asia flight over the Ukraine. Aleksandr Sigalus has joined Travalco three months ago as manager of group and incentives; he can be reached at Aleksandr@travalco.com. Also from the Russian Service Bureau, has been hired as group specialist.
