Area Director of Marketing, Restaurants - Doc Crow’s & Joella’s Hot Chicken

• Work Today, Get Paid today, with Daily Pay!
• Free Telemedicine and Virtual Mental Health care access for All Associates starting day one!
• Multiple Health Insurance and Life Insurance options
• 401k Plan + Company Match
• Paid Time Off
• Holiday Pay
• Pet Insurance
• Employee Assistance Program
• Schulte Savings Marketplace Discounts on event tickets, electronics, gym memberships + more!

We are seeking a strategic, commercially minded and hands-on Area Director of Marketing to lead brand strategy, marketing execution, and business growth for Doc Crow's Louisville, Doc Crow's Indianapolis, and Joella's Hot Chicken. This role serves as the senior marketing leader responsible for building demand, strengthening brand relevance, increasing guest frequency, and driving revenue performance across all locations.

The Area Director owns the complete marketing ecosystem, including brand strategy, content, social media, creative development, paid media, public relations, local marketing, partnerships, guest experience initiatives, and performance measurement. This leader will translate business objectives into integrated campaigns, memorable guest experiences, and measurable commercial results.

Working closely with operations and corporate leadership, the director will develop annual marketing plans, oversee execution across all channels, manage agency and creative partners, guide local activation efforts, and ensure marketing investments generate meaningful traffic, sales, loyalty, and profitability.

• Own distinct brand positioning, voice, messaging and visual consistency for Doc Crow’s and Joella’s across channels, campaigns, menus and restaurant touchpoints.
• Develop and own annual brand marketing plans, quarterly priorities and integrated promotional calendars aligned with revenue goals, guest occasions and seasonal demand.
• Build scalable campaign playbooks, briefs, toolkits and measurement standards while tailoring execution to individual markets and restaurant opportunities.
• Monitor guest insights, competition, menu trends and market performance to identify growth opportunities and sharpen each brand’s relevance.

• Own the content strategy, editorial calendar, and storytelling approach across Doc Crow's and Joella's, ensuring consistency in brand voice while highlighting local relevance and restaurant-level experiences.
• Lead creative development across photography, video, graphic design, menus, digital advertising, websites, email marketing, in-store materials, and promotional campaigns.
• Establish content production standards and oversee the creation of assets that support brand, sales, loyalty, public relations, and recruitment initiatives.
• Direct social media strategy, content planning, community engagement, and channel performance across all locations and platforms.
• Build influencer, creator, and ambassador partnerships that expand awareness, generate authentic engagement, and drive restaurant traffic.
• Identify opportunities to tell compelling stories around food, beverage, bourbon culture, chef expertise, hospitality, community involvement, and guest experiences.
• Ensure all campaigns include an integrated content amplification strategy across owned, earned, and paid media channels.

• Lead strategies to grow restaurant awareness, visits, check average and repeat frequency through a balanced mix of brand, value, promotional and occasion-driven marketing.
• For Joella’s, direct the brand calendar, value and traffic strategy, product and limited-time-offer launches, family occasions, local-store marketing and market-specific demand plans.
• For Doc Crow’s, strengthen destination dining and local relevance through dining occasions, bourbon and culinary storytelling, neighborhood outreach, game-day/event demand and restaurant-specific marketing.
• Partner with operations and finance to align campaigns with menu economics, capacity, dayparts, sales pacing and profit contribution; adapt plans based on results.

• Own the digital acquisition and retention strategy across websites, local search, paid search, paid social, online ordering touchpoints and guest communications.
• Lead CRM, loyalty and lifecycle marketing strategy, including segmentation, acquisition, first-to-second visit conversion, frequency, reactivation and win-back initiatives.
• Direct paid media and agency partners; set objectives, oversee budgets and optimize for qualified demand, attributable sales and return on investment.
• Own the annual media strategy and marketing channel mix across paid search, paid social, streaming audio, display, video, local sponsorships, and emerging marketing platforms.
• Allocate marketing investments across brands, markets, and channels based on performance, growth potential, and return on investment.
• Develop audience strategies that connect media investment to traffic growth, guest acquisition, loyalty participation, and repeat visitation.
• Establish clear KPIs, attribution frameworks, and reporting standards for all paid and owned marketing initiatives.

• Establish practical local-store marketing frameworks, accountabilities and operating rhythms to help restaurant teams activate one prioritized marketing plan.
• Identify and manage community partnerships, sponsorships, local events, business relationships and promotions with measurable commercial benefit.
• Lead brand PR and communications priorities, including openings, seasonal initiatives, earned media, reputation management and issue response in coordination with leadership.
• Provide operators with clear toolkits, timelines and performance visibility; collaborate across markets without shifting marketing ownership to restaurant teams.

• Directly manage and coach the Doc Crow’s Private Events & Marketing Ops Manager, establishing private events and catering sales targets, pipeline expectations, conversion goals and performance reviews for both locations.
• Provide strategic oversight of prospecting plans, local account development, event and catering lead generation, repeat business and sales enablement; hold the manager accountable for day-to-day sales execution and follow-through.
• Partner with restaurant leaders on banquet/event packages, menus, collateral, tour experiences, pricing inputs and operational readiness to deliver compelling, profitable offers.
• Ensure the manager coordinates Doc Crow’s local social media execution, menu and collateral management, marketing operations and restaurant-level campaign support in alignment with the director’s brand plan.
• Lead strategies to drive catering sales for Joella’s in partnership with operations team.

• Serve as the primary marketing partner to operations leadership, ensuring alignment between marketing strategy, restaurant execution, guest experience, and commercial performance.
• Manage annual marketing budgets, agency scopes and vendor relationships; prioritize resources across two brands based on business opportunity and impact.
• Balance long-range planning with hands-on execution, working across several restaurant locations and traveling as business needs require.

• Partner with operations leaders to ensure marketing initiatives are translated into exceptional on-property guest experiences.
• Develop signature brand activations, seasonal events, community partnerships, and experiential marketing programs that strengthen awareness and drive visitation.
• Lead marketing strategy and execution for restaurant events, local promotions, culinary experiences, bourbon-focused programming, community engagements, and strategic partnerships.
• Identify opportunities to create distinctive experiences that differentiate each brand and reinforce their positioning within their respective markets.
• Collaborate with culinary, operations, and restaurant leadership teams to elevate menu launches, limited-time offers, and promotional programs through compelling guest-facing execution.
• Monitor guest feedback, reviews, and customer sentiment trends to identify opportunities to improve both marketing effectiveness and guest experience.

• Build a disciplined reporting cadence connecting campaign activity to traffic, sales, guest frequency, product mix, acquisition cost, CRM engagement and marketing ROI.
• Review results by brand, location, campaign and channel; identify corrective actions, tests and investment shifts with operating partners.
• For Doc Crow’s, track private events and catering leads, pipeline value, conversion, booked revenue and repeat account growth with the Sales & Marketing Manager.
• Present concise performance reporting, insights and recommendations to senior marketing and restaurant leadership.

• Bachelor’s degree in marketing, Business, Communications, Hospitality or a related field preferred.
• 5-7 years of progressive marketing experience, with demonstrated restaurant or multi-unit food-and-beverage experience strongly preferred.
• Experience leading multi-unit restaurant, hospitality, lifestyle, or consumer-facing brands.
• Demonstrated success developing content strategies, creative campaigns, social media programs, and integrated marketing plans.
• Experience managing social media performance, content production, influencer partnerships, and brand storytelling initiatives.
• Strong understanding of experiential marketing, events, local-store marketing, and community engagement strategies.
• Proven ability to balance strategic leadership with hands-on execution in a fast-paced, multi-location environment.
• Experience directing agency partners, content creators, photographers, videographers, and other creative resources.
• Proven ability to lead distinct brands, develop integrated annual plans and translate strategy into measurable local sales and traffic performance.
• Understanding of restaurant economics, promotional effectiveness, catering/private event demand and guest purchase behavior.
• Excellent communication, creative judgment, project management and analytical skills; proactive, collaborative and comfortable working hands-on.
• Louisville, Kentucky base preferred; ability to travel to restaurant locations and markets as required.