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BJ, 1975
MA in Advertising, 1980
Senior Vice President, Marketing and Advertising
RadioShack
A 27-year veteran of the world of advertising and marketing, Jim McDonald joined RadioShack in January of 1998 and serves today as Senior Vice President of Marketing and Advertising. Prior to joining RadioShack, Jim served for 4 years as the Senior VP and RadioShack’s Account Director for Young & Rubicam’s The Lord Group. While Jim worked for this NY-based advertising agency, RadioShack’s initial brand repositioning advertising and the tagline "You’ve Got Questions, We’ve Got Answers." were introduced. Some of the other brands Jim has worked on over his career include Pizza Hut, Ford, Lincoln-Mercury, Chevron, The Westin Hotels, Gulf, IBM, Stouffer’s, Wurlitzer, Homart Malls, Compaq, RCA, Sprint, MSN and the Texas Commerce banking network.
"I moved back to Texas from San Francisco to be a part of re-engineering RadioShack -- one of the best known and loved brands in America, into a Superbrand at the forefront of the ongoing digital revolution and home and personal connectivity," said McDonald.
Before his work on RadioShack, Jim was based with Young & Rubicam in San Francisco and headed up the advertising for Chevron and it’s over 13,000 retail gasoline, food mart and car care outlets. "The Simply Smarter", Techron additives-focused advertising for Chevron still stands up as some of the best work in the gasoline category," said McDonald.
In 1975, Jim earned a Bachelor of Journalism with Honors from The University of Texas at Austin, followed by a Master of Arts in Advertising in 1980. He continues to stay involved with The University as a frequent client of advertising campaign classes.
"Over the years my staff has been studded with UT graduates. My involvement with School of Communications’ advertising campaign classes has both generated some great work for RadioShack and served as a pipeline for top talent," said McDonald.
Currently RadioShack is using a celebrity advertising campaign Jim initiated to contemporize the Brand. "Our family of spokespersons began with Howie Long and Teri Hatcher, but we’ve since added Vanessa Williams and Ving Rhames, and most recently Shaquille O’Neal, to keep the three-year-old, highly successful campaign fresh and unexpected. Adding The Shaq for The Shack will provide new impetus for the campaign into 2003," said McDonald.
"One of the accomplishments I’m most proud of is the TV commercial we filmed on the International Space Station last year. No one had ever done it before and I enjoyed going to Moscow to work with the Russian Space Agency who made it all possible. Using space exploration to elevate the RadioShack brand is definitely applying an out-of-this world advertising approach," joked Jim McDonald.
Jim and his wife and two children currently make their home in Ft. Worth.