Rethinking Ethnic & Modern Retail Marketing with Ariela Nerubay, EVP & Chief Marketing Officer at LA Based Curacao Retail

Something different on the podcast for this episode: Meet Ariela Nerubay, EVP & Chief Marketing Officer at Curacao retail stores, a fellow 2024 ReThink Retail Top Retail Expert and leader in ethnic and modern marketing strategies and tactics.  You might not recognize the LA-based retail stores she leads, but the insights, challenges and opportunities translate well on the mic and across the border.   

• Curacao website: https://icuracao.com/
• Instagram: @icuracao_usa
• Twitter (X): @icuracao
• Facebook: CuracaoUSA
• TikTok: @curacaousa

About Ariela

As the EVP and Chief Marketing Officer at Curacao retail stores, Ariela Nerubay has

been instrumental in driving the company's business strategy, brand positioning, and

online expansion efforts. Since joining, the company has experienced an impressive 10-

30% YoY growth in both customers and sales. Over the past five years, Ariela has led

the charge in repositioning the Curacao brand and expanding its target audience,

resulting in the attraction of new customer segments and increased scalability.

Ariela's efforts have included designing programs aimed at improving customer

experiences, streamlining creative production processes, and promoting a culture that

prioritizes customer-centricity, data-driven decision-making, and agility. Drawing from

her extensive experience in entertainment, startups, and retail, Ariela has played a

pivotal role in transforming Curacao from a traditional retailer to a digital-forward brand.

Currently, Ariela is focused on designing and implementing Curacao's marketing

technology stack, which aims to provide hyper-personalized customer experiences

through first-party data enrichment. Additionally, she has created and leads the

company's first Customer Advocacy Group, which is dedicated to evaluating and

improving both on and offline customer journeys. Ariela also serves as the leader of

Curacao's Community Foundation.

With over 20 years of experience in marketing, Ariela is an award-winning executive

who specializes in targeting the multicultural consumer. She has worked with several

esteemed brands, including Wal-Mart, Comcast, Allstate, Univision Communications,

The Walt Disney Company, Fox Studios, and Sony Pictures. During her tenure at these

companies, Ariela has been responsible for spearheading marketing efforts aimed at

reaching the U.S. Hispanic customer.

In addition to her role as CMO at Curacao, Ariela also serves as an adjunct professor at

USC's Marshall School of Business and Annenberg School of Communication and

Journalism. She is also a member of the Board of Trustees at the Boys and Girls of

America, where she is involved in the Impact and Youth of the Year Committees.

Prior to joining Curacao, Ariela served as Vice President of Multicultural Marketing at

The Walt Disney Studios, where she led the multicultural strategy for several films

including the re-launch of the Star Wars franchise. She also spent 12 years at Univision

Communications, where she held multiple senior executive positions, including General

Manager of Univision Cable Networks. In this role, she built the marketing department

from scratch and was responsible for leading channel distribution sales, public relations,

advertising sales promotions, B2C and B2B advertising, and marketing efforts for five

Spanish language music and movie cable networks.

Under Ariela's leadership, her marketing departments received more than 24 industry

awards, including NAMIC's (National Association for Multi-Ethnicity in Communication)

Excellence in Multicultural Marketing Awards, The Cablefaxies, and CTAM's (Cable and

Telecommunications Association of Marketers) Golden Palm and CTAM Mark Award.

Ariela herself has been recognized for her work with a "Luminary" award by the National

Association for Multi-Ethnicity in Communication, a "Successful Latinas in Business

Award" in the Media and Communications category by the National Latina

Businesswomen Association and was selected as one of the Most Influential Minorities

in Cable by Cable Fax Magazine.

Before joining Univision, Ariela worked for six years on the agency side of U.S. Hispanic

advertising and PR efforts for several Fortune 500 companies, including Miller Brewing

Company, Allstate Insurance, Washington Mutual Bank, Comcast, Adelphia, Cox,

Charter, Time Warner, and HBO. Prior to that, she served as a marketing specialist for

Wal-Mart headquarters in Mexico City, where she was a member of the team that

launched Walmart's first private label credit card in Mexico.

Ariela's broad expertise encompasses the entire marketing landscape, from client and

agency to media.

Ariela lives with her husband and three daughters in Long Beach, California.

The Voice of Retail podcast is presented by Hale, a performance marketing partner trusted by brands like ASICS, Saje, and Orangetheory to scale with focus and impact.

Michael LeBlanc is the president and founder of M.E. LeBlanc & Company Inc, a senior retail advisor, keynote speaker and now, media entrepreneur.  He has been on the front lines of retail industry change for his entire career. 

Michael has delivered keynotes, hosted fire-side discussions and participated worldwide in thought leadership panels, most recently on the main stage in Toronto at Retail Council of Canada’s Retail Marketing conference with leaders from Walmart & Google.  He brings 25+ years of brand/retail/marketing & eCommerce leadership experience with Levi's, Black & Decker, Hudson's Bay, CanWest Media, Pandora Jewellery, The Shopping Channel and Retail Council of Canada to his advisory, speaking and media practice.

Michael produces and hosts a network of leading retail trade podcasts, including the award-winning No.1 independent retail industry podcast in America, Remarkable Retail with his partner, Dallas-based best-selling author Steve Dennis; Canada's top retail industry podcast The Voice of Retail and Canada's top food industry and one of the top Canadian-produced management independent podcasts in the country, The Food Professor with Dr. Sylvain Charlebois from Dalhousie University in Halifax.

Rethink Retail has recognized Michael as one of the top global retail experts for the fifth year in a row, the National Retail Federation has designated Michael as on their Top Retail Voices for 2025, Thinkers 360 has named him on of the Top 50 global thought leaders in retail, RTIH has named him a top 100 global though leader in retail technology and Coresight Research has named Michael a Retail AI Influencer.  If you are a BBQ fan, you can tune into Michael’s cooking show, Last Request BBQ, on YouTube, Instagram, X and yes, TikTok.

Michael is available for keynote presentations helping retailers, brands and retail industry insiders explaining the current state and future of the retail industry in North America and around the world.