Catherine Walstad

When Catherine was five years old, her parents strapped a pair of wooden water skis to her feet and fired up the family’s old Sea Ray. She’s been addicted to adrenaline and adventure ever since.

After trick skiing, racing around in speed boats, rappelling off cliffs, and trekking across glaciers, Catherine discovered a new kind of adventure that resulted in far fewer broken bones: media buying. A young star at LAKANA, she earned her stripes managing campaigns on NBCOlympics.com during the Athens and Torino games, thriving on the thrill of steering multimillion-dollar accounts like Coke, Kleenex, AT&T, Sony, GM, Volkswagen, and Visa.

Record success. It’s no surprise that when Catherine took the helm of Marketing Architects’ Media Buying Services team, she steered it to its most successful year in TV. She says it’s the thrill of launching new clients; trying out new shows, programs and networks; and finding big breakthroughs that gets her adrenaline pumping now.