Digital Cinema Media’s CEO Karen Stacey has been named Media Leader of the Year – Media Owner at the 2022 Media Week Awards!
The 2022 Media Week Awards took place at the JW Marriott Grosvenor House London on Park Lane last night, to celebrate the industry’s incredible achievements over the past year.
After the challenges of the past two years, all at DCM can agree that no one deserved the award of Media Leader of the Year more than CEO Karen Stacey.
Karen faced her toughest challenge yet post-pandemic, with screens closed for 16 months and revenues disappearing overnight. Despite the circumstances, she quickly and efficiently set about rebuilding a company, team and industry reputation.
Repositioning cinema, Karen pivoted buyers away from the currency of box office numbers to focus instead on the synergy with TV and gaming with its front-facing, attentive audience. An in-depth research study was conducted, with Lumen Research, in response to customers’ concerns around attention. This key data from research was used alongside new insights from Applied Consumer Neuroscience to launch a new offering called ‘DCM Studios Presents’, dedicated to branded entertainment, longer narratives and storytelling.
As part of the CEO’s commitment to accountability and transparency, DCM engaged PwC to provide ratification of DCM’s data sources and calculation methods of audience TVRs. This provided agencies simple and robust data at a time of extreme TV inflation. By changing the narrative, Karen revolutionised the way that cinema is now traded and measured.
Karen is also hugely committed to fostering a culture of wellbeing, fairness and inclusivity amongst the DCM team. Staff have undertaken LGBTQ+ awareness training, an introduction to British Sign Language course, and regularly take part in supporting charity initiatives. As a result, DCM has been voted a 2022 Best Place to Work by Campaign Magazine for the fifth consecutive year.
Despite the challenges cinema has faced, DCM and the cinema advertising industry are thriving once again, with an incredible team under brave, expert, spirited and thoughtful leadership.
Empathetic, strong and inspiring, Karen’s motto is to “walk the walk” and with her at the helm, cinema is “always looking forward”, and is undoubtedly The Best Seat in Media. Congratulations Karen Stacey!