Guest
Kate Ridley
Chief Brand Officer, Stanley 1913
A brand leader shaped by sport and product, from Adidas to Stanley, who builds iconic brands on firm truths, deep listening and a willingness to respond at the speed of culture.
About
Kate Ridley is Chief Brand Officer of Stanley 1913, the heritage drinkware brand now known simply as Stanley, where she holds a broad remit spanning consumer insights, all facets of marketing, merchandising, product creation and design, creative innovation and transformation. She is known for rebuilding the brand's foundations during a period of hypergrowth and for pulling consumer insight through from engineering to storytelling.
Ridley built much of her career in sport, spending a long period at Adidas, where she says she was responsible for categories and products as well as marketing and brand building. That dual structure shaped her belief that a sharp consumer insight should be carried with fidelity across every consumer touchpoint. She moved into consulting before a teammate called to say Stanley needed help to stand up and professionalise its marketing organisation.
At Stanley, Ridley arrived into a business that, by her account, had grown ten times in about four years before her time, and set about creating updated brand foundations. She established brand truths of quality, sustainability, originality and inventiveness as a decision filter, moved the consumer insight model to weekly surveys across seven markets, and championed deeper heritage storytelling after discovering that younger consumers wanted the origin story. She points to the Leo Messi partnership and the growth of Mate in the US as examples of an organic, insight-led approach to building a global brand.
Career27 years
- 2025 to now Stanley 1913 Chief Brand Officer
- 2024 to now Change Agency PDX Co-Founder
- 2022 to 2023 Allbirds Chief Brand and Product Officer
- 2018 to 2022 adidas Senior Vice President, Brand
Show earlier roles: adidas, ridley/robusti Consulting
- 2017 to 2018 adidas Vice President, Marketing, Concept to Consumer
- 2014 to 2017 adidas Vice President, Training Apparel & Kids
- 2013 to 2014 ridley/robusti Consulting Marketing and Business Development
- 2008 to 2012 adidas Business Unit Director, adidas Originals
- 2006 to 2007 adidas Category Manager - Originals
- 2003 to 2005 adidas Global Category Manager, Training
- 1999 to 2003 adidas Category Manager
How Kate thinks3 convictions
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Heritage belongs to Gen Z
Ridley assumed younger consumers were indifferent to where a brand came from, and was proved wrong. She now treats heritage as a living asset, telling deeper, more impactful stories about the brand's origins and truths. For her, the surprise reframed what a hundred-year-old brand should lead with.
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Mindset before structure
Ridley argues the first investment in change is behavioural, not structural. People hold tightly to their quarterly and annual plans, so making them more agile and far less precious is the real work. Tools and pods follow once the mindset accepts testing, learning and the possibility of failing.
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Inspiration from the world
Ridley draws inspiration less from consumer data and more from observation, watching people shop, interact and dress, often at the airport. She keeps the maxim that the answer is in the streets. It is of a piece with her insistence that empathy, not dashboards, sits at the heart of marketing.