Accomplished financial marketer Gretchen H. Garrigues has joined First Data Corporation, the global leader in payment technology and services solutions, as chief marketing officer.
In this role, she will lead the company's global marketing efforts, including corporate and product marketing, branding, innovation and thought leadership. Garrigues will be based in New York City and will report to Joe Plumeri, vice chair of First Data's board of directors.
"Gretchen brings to First Data an ingrained instinct for how our company is, first and foremost, a partner to help businesses of all sizes flourish through innovations and solutions that help them grow," said Plumeri. "Gretchen and her team will share that message with the thousands of financial institutions and millions of merchants with whom we do business every day and carry it forward to a new legion of First Data clients," Plumeri added.
Garrigues comes to First Data with a deep financial services background and leadership skills developed over a long career with GE Capital. Most recently, she served as senior managing director of global strategic marketing, responsible for strategic planning, new product development, market intelligence and customer insights. Joining GE Capital in 1997 in the firm's Paris office, Garrigues held positions of increasing responsibility that spanned a wide array of financial products and services, ranging from consumer finance, credit cards and insurance to business credit, capital markets, private equity, equipment financing, commercial leasing and structured corporate lending. Garrigues led marketing organizations for several GE Capital businesses around the globe, producing successful commercial strategies and building high performing marketing teams, as well as strengthening customer focus and value propositions to drive growth, profitability and long-term market sustainability.
Prior to joining GE Capital, Garrigues served as a foreign trade officer for the U.S. & Foreign Commercial Service based in Paris, after running a successful startup venture providing language training and translation services across Europe. She is a gradduate of the University of Virginia and the Institut d'Etudes Politiques de Paris and holds an MBA from the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
Garrigues served as a board member of the Commercial Finance Association (CFA) and the National Council on Competitive Intelligence. She also served as a board member of GE Capital Chairman's Global Diversity Council and was chair of the GE Women's Network for the company's Stamford/Norwalk hub. She received numerous honors while at GE Capital, including the 2013 GE Capital Leadership Award for Outstanding Contributions to Diversity and the 2012 GE Women's Network Award for Outstanding Leadership.
Garrigues resides in Stamford, Connecticut.