Ross Copperman

Ross Copperman is currently the Chief Commercial Officer at MeatEater. Prior to this, they served as the President of First Lite from July 2013 to April 2021. During their time with First Lite, Ross led the brand through explosive growth while building out highly proficient manufacturing and product development teams. Additionally, they managed and continued to build out talented marketing, ecom, and finance teams with 92% employee retention. Ross also bolstered the most revered Customer Service team in the hunting space. Ross continued to increase EBITDA despite significant opex investment while overseeing the evolution of a sophisticated tech stack. Ross was also involved in NetSuite ERP deployment as well as Hubspot CRM combined with Shopify Plus Ecom platform and a multitude of extensions. The brand grew from a mid sized player to one of the three biggest revenue players in hunting apparel within a year of being acquired.

Before their time with First Lite, Ross served as the General Manager of E-Commerce for Smith Sport Optics from September 2006 to July 2013. During that time, they oversaw the growth of Smith’s e-commerce business from $2 million to over $20 million in sales. Additionally, Ross built and managed a team of 15+ people, developed and executed successful marketing campaigns, and increased traffic to the website by 400%.

Ross began their career in marketing as the Director of Marketing for New West Insurance from June 2003 to September 2006. In this role, they managed a $1 million budget, oversaw a team of 4 direct reports, and increased sales by 25%. Ross also created and implemented successful marketing campaigns that increased brand awareness and generated new leads.

Ross’s first marketing role was as the Marketing Manager for Sun Valley/Ketchum Chamber of Commerce from April 2000 to June 2003. In this role, they managed all aspects of the Chamber’s marketing initiatives, developed and implemented successful advertising campaigns, and increased membership by 10%.

Ross Copperman received a Bachelor of Arts in Political Science/Business from the University of Oregon.

Ross Copperman works with Annie Banks Raser - SVP, Global Production, Jimmy McGuire - CFO, and Taggart Spenst - VP, Ecommerce & CRM. Their manager is Dan Chumbler, CEO.