The Team

Experiential Ventures Hospitality (EVH) is a team of hospitality, food & beverage, branding/marketing, retail, design, entertainment, technology and real estate leaders who have worked with some of the most iconic brands in the world.

 

CHRIS SCHROEDER
Chief Executive Officer

As CEO of Experiential Ventures Hospitality, Schroeder has lead the creation and expansion of significant projects with legacy brands including Sports Illustrated, Conde Nast, Authentic Brands Group and Emmitt Smith, as well as creating proprietary brands like The Garage. Schroeder has held the position of Chairman and CEO of Sports Illustrated Resorts where he had been a key player in creating and expanding the Sports Illustrated Resorts brand.

Over the last 30 years Chris Schroeder has also been an interactive media pioneer, visionary resort developer, brand creator and marketing leader for globally recognized brands. He brings an award-winning background in creating and implementing large scale marketing, branding and development projects for globally recognized organizations including American Express, California Tourism Commission and MGM Grand Resorts. He is a founding partner of the UMUSIC hotel and entertainment center concept that is a partnership with the world’s largest music company Universal Music Group.

Schroeder previously served as Chief Marketing Officer for Veremonte, a multi-billion-dollar investment company out of London, where he worked to create the largest leisure development in Europe, bringing partnerships with Hard Rock Hotels and Cirque du Soleil. He also worked to incubate and launch Formula E, the first fully electric racing championship in the world, with such notable partners as Leonardo di Caprio, Michael Andretti, Alain Prost, and Virgin Racing. Races are held in iconic cities including Paris, London, and New York.

As an interactive media pioneer, Schroeder founded the world’s leading internet development company for the hospitality industry at the time, with 90% of the world’s largest hotels as his client. Additionally, he led the development of the first online reservation system of its kind in the travel industry for MGM Resorts and Hilton/Park Place Entertainment. During this time Schroeder also played a lead role in creating and implementing a massive rebranding and redevelopment campaign for MGM Resorts, which included developing a multimedia roadshow to present to stockholders and Wall Street investors to secure funding to implement the project.

Schroeder also served as President of the Interactive Division for Custom Marketing Group, the exclusive destination marketing group at the time for American Express, where he developed and managed digital media campaigns for over 20 leading Tourism Boards for destinations including State of California, State of Florida, Country of Mexico, and cities of Las Vegas, Cancun, Orlando, New York, and Chicago. Many of the programs Schroeder worked on were responsible for double digit tourism growth and hundreds of millions of dollars in consumer spend in-market.

Mr. Schroeder has also been a leader in travel marketing, incentives, and loyalty, having created a patented rewards system and founding a leading incentive company that created proprietary products and long-term marketing campaigns for companies including Capital One, American Express, Bank of America, Samsonite, and Ford Motor Company. Many of his programs were ongoing and included massive cooperative marketing initiatives incorporating local tourism boards, corporate partners, attractions, media, airlines and hotels. Schroeder also created the first custom travel offers for the Today Show, the #1 morning show in America, in addition to Fox and Friends, CBS, and others. Additionally, Schroeder, created a proprietary travel rewards system that multiple companies used including the world’s largest online travel company, Priceline/Booking.com.

During college, Schroeder founded one of the largest college travel and marketing companies in the country, with clients including Ocean Pacific, Miller Beer, Hawaiian Tropics, Ray Ban and Ujena Swimwear. This led to him being hired directly out of college to serve as the National Marketing and Retail Director for the company owning Ujena Swimwear, Swimwear Illustrated and Runner’s World Magazines.

Schroeder has been an invited speaker at large conferences globally for groups like American Express, Mexican Tourism Board, National Renewable Energy Laboratory, Caribbean Tourism Organization, Global Automotive Trends, American Resort Development Association (ARDA) and Intel Partnership Showcase.

MARK KORROS
President

Mark Korros is a highly successful CEO, who is skillful at designing winning business growth strategies and inspiring organizations to succeed. He has consistently delivered rapid growth driving measurable, sustainable multimillion-dollar returns, increasing shareholder value. Mark is a strategic out of the box thinker with an affinity for encouraging an entrepreneurial culture within an organization.

Mark has worked with private equity, privately owned and public companies solidifying their business base to provide organic growth and cultivating new profitable growth opportunities. Prior to becoming President of Experiential Ventures, he served as CEO at Covercraft Industries, he created a Value Creation Blueprint establishing the company as a platform and targeted acquisitions that would fortify his vision of dominating the aftermarket custom-fit vehicle protection products category. Over a 4-year period he made 5 acquisitions each accretive and fulfilling the vision and the company leading to the sale of his company at a double digit multiple on EBITDA performance.

Mark’s unique approach to establish a company in a “Category of One '' has served as a catalyst to create a diverse perspective that demands excellence, embraces best practices and fuels a culture that not only ensures a business’s success but brings its products to the forefront of customer preference. Having been responsible for building brands and unlocking their value he understands the leverage and opportunity leading brands have in the marketplace. His strategy has effectively been employed across multiple brands, products and industries. It is being driven through customer focus, creative marketing and collaborations, innovative new product development, optimizing production capabilities and continuous improvement initiatives to create lasting impact. 

His career and industry experience are highly diversified. Mark has served in the top executive leadership roles for premium brands, wholesale/manufacturing/retailers that include Covercraft Industries Filson, Samsonite, Pendleton, FranklinCovey, Reebok and Health-tex. He has also led two pureplay multichannel catalog/internet retailers, Central Restaurant products and Levenger that ultimately ushered him into a database and digital marketing agency, ParadyszMatera, where he led efforts to design a program for defining MultiChannel Revenue Attribution. 

 In addition, Mark had launched 3 major websites, overseen manufacturing facilities in 5 companies and built over 450 retail stores throughout his career. All combined, his cross-functional experience in marketing, product development, manufacturing, finance and distribution has enabled him to quickly assess a company's strengths and challenges to work with the organization and develop a profitable growth strategy.   

 

KENT PURDY
Chief Innovation Officer

Kent Purdy is a seasoned entrepreneur and business leader who has worked in the entertainment, technology and hospitality industries for over 30 years. His experience includes to create a ticketing platform for major music festivals, including Bonnaroo and others. He has produced multiple movies with notable talent including Charlie Sheen, Ezra Miller and Olivia Culpo.

He was a key player in the launch of the UMUSIC Hotels concept and as Chief Strategy Officer for Experiential Ventures, he continues to help expand the brand as well as other initiatives with leading brands and organizations including Sports Illustrated, Conde Nast, Authentic Brands Group and Akoin.

JEFFREY COHEN
Chief Operating Officer

Jeffrey Cohen is a seasoned technologist and a visionary leader with over three decades of experience providing solutions in a range of industries. He serves as the COO at Experiential Ventures Hospitality. In this role, he oversees technology, overall business operations, in addition to all marketing activities, teams and strategies.

Previously, Jeffrey spent over 24 years as the CIO and CTO of one of the largest privately held direct marketing agencies in the US. During this tenure, he spearheaded large technology teams engaged in development projects that encompassed the creation of both internal and external software solutions, along with the robust infrastructure required to support them. His portfolio of accomplishments includes enterprise-level development and analytics initiatives that played a pivotal role in supporting marketing endeavors for renowned companies such as Microsoft, Capital One, Dell, KPMG, and America Online.

Drawing from his extensive background in business, marketing, and the intricacies of hardware and software, Jeffrey takes a holistic approach to problem solving and tackles challenges with an agnostic mindset, ensuring that the most effective and efficient solutions are always identified and implemented. 

ERIC SCHROEDER
CREATIVE DIRECTOR

Eric Schroeder is a seasoned creative powerhouse who serves as the Creative Director and the VP of Visual Design at Experiential Ventures Hospitality. With a steadfast commitment to upholding a unified brand identity across all platforms, Eric oversees and guides his creative teams in their endeavors.

With over two decades of experience, Eric is a passionate and ambitious executive with expertise in developing, directing, and executing successful projects for high-profile brands. Eric studied marketing and advertising at Texas State University and visual art and design at the Art Institute of Dallas. Most recently, Eric served as a senior creative designer at USAA from 2019 to 2021, preceeded by a role as Senior Art Director at The Wood Agency from 2012 to 2019.

Eric has earned numerous prestigious awards throughout his career, including Gold and Silver ADDY Awards, a Silver Graphis, and claiming multiple gold medals at the Texas Marketing Summit for his exemplary work in digital user experience and print design. Eric attributes his success in creative design and marketing to his penchant for conceptual innovation, unwavering work ethic, and his innate ability to foster productive teamwork and leadership.