Laurel Cutler '46

Alumnae Achievement Awards 1990

Advertising and Marketing Executive

One of the most powerful women in advertising and marketing, Laurel Cutler has thrived in the corporate world. She graduated from Wellesley with a degree in philosophy with honors in 1946, and, apart from a job as a reporter with the Washington Post, Cutler has worked in advertising for her entire career.

In 1964, Cutler joined McCann-Erickson, a global advertising agency. Over the course of eight years, she served as the director, creative director and senior vice president of the company, managing the advertising accounts for companies such as General Foods, John Hancock Corporation, and the ortho division of Johnson & Johnson. In 1972, she left McCann-Erickson and joined the creative team at FCB/Leber Katz Partners. With LKP, she developed the marketing planning department to promote brands for the future. The department analyzes and anticipates consumer trends and, thus, is able to aid clients in the development of new products, services and businesses.

Due to her accomplishments at LKP, Cutler was simultaneously named a corporate officer of the Chrysler Corporation. She held senior management positions at the two companies for three years, but she resigned from the Chrysler Corporation in 1991. Cutler has been nationally recognized for her many accomplishments. In 1985, she received the Woman in Communications Matrix Award for Advertising, and in 1987, she was named Woman of the Year in Management. In the same year that she was honored with the Alumnae Achievement Award, Cutler was listed as one of the fifty most powerful women in America by Ladies’ Home Journal. She was also active on the Business Leadership Council and the Marketing Advisory Committee at Wellesley College.