Crossmark


Crossmark, Inc., stylized as CROSSMARK, is a sales and marketing services company that operates within the consumer goods industry. The company was established in 1905 by Willis Johnson and E. Leslie Hunt in Fort Smith, Arkansas as a supply point for groups traveling to the Oklahoma Territory. Crossmark contributes research and data to the Food Marketing Institute. The company serves grocery, mass, club, drug, convenience store, and home improvement channels.

History

In 1997, Crossmark was one of three companies that collectively controlled 75 percent of the sales and marketing services industry. In 2012, The Dallas Morning News reported that the Plano, Texas-based Crossmark had 34,000 employees and has an estimated annual revenue of $1 billion. In December 2012, a majority of the company was sold to the private equity firm Warburg Pincus. In November 2013, Crossmark acquired the assets of PromoWorks.

Products and services

Crossmark's services include headquarter sales, retail merchandising, in-store data collection, event marketing, retail technology, and retail analytics.
On August 6, 2013, Crossmark agreed to buy Marketing Werks in Chicago. The Marketing Werks deal will contribute to its total annual revenue of nearly $1 billion. Marketing Werks, based in Chicago, provides experiential marketing campaigns for companies in several consumer industries. It will become part of Crossmark Marketing Services, which offers in-store events, experiential marketing, shopper marketing, consumer engagement and field intelligence. Mike Graen has joined CROSSMARK as Vice President/Managing Director for CROSSMARK's Center for Collaboration in Bentonville, Arkansas, which opened in July 2014.

Recognition

In 2010 and 2011, InformationWeek ranked Crossmark on its list of most-innovative users of business technology.