Jeri Denniston

Jeri Denniston is co-founder and Strategic Market Development Director of Denner Group International, which provides innovative business solutions for maximum sustained success. Denner Group applies “systems thinking” to help clients develop their strategic, business and marketing plans to achieve their desired outcomes. Denniston oversees strategic marketing functions for Denner Group, identifying new market opportunities for clients, and helping them maximize their marketing efforts from planning to execution.

Prior to rejoining Denner Group, Denniston held various positions over nine years at The San Diego Union-Tribune, most recently as a Community Relations Manager, responsible for multicultural events and the central and south zones of the County. During her tenure there, she led the paper's involvement with key Latino organizations and leaders, implementing one of the paper's key initiatives to support the Latino community. She wrote the business plan, launched and directed the start-up of the paper's Spanish-language weekly, Enlace, which continues today with a circulation of 80,000 countywide. Denniston also directed the paper's market development efforts, researching trends and identifying niche marketing opportunities among underserved communities. One of her key accomplishments was a benchmark research study of the San Diego Latino market to drive the paper's Latino involvement strategy.

Denniston has more than 25 years of experience in all facets of domestic and international marketing. She collaborated on cross-border marketing plans, feasibility studies, and divestiture prospectuses for a variety of real estate and manufacturing businesses in Mexico. She spent five years in the marketing information industry handling public relations, events marketing and conference planning for one of the largest target marketing information companies in the U.S., Equifax National Decision Systems, resulting in more than $1,000,000 in net new business to the company. Denniston also spent five years in banking developing new financial products to serve mid-level real estate and brokerage clients, conducting market analyses, and directing creative services and events marketing functions for the holding company of an 11-state banking organization.

Fluent in Spanish, Denniston holds a Masters in International Management from Thunderbird - the Garvin School of International Management in Glendale, AZ. With 10 years of overseas living in Indonesia and extensive travel worldwide, Denniston has developed an appreciation and enthusiasm for Latino, European, and Asian cultures, cuisine, art and music.

Denniston has been active in the international business and professional community since 1978. She is a founding member of the San Diego County Hispanic Chamber of Commerce, past chair of ArtsBusXpress, past president of the San Diego-Tijuana Sister Cities Society, and a member of the South County Economic Development Council. She is also a founding board member of the Thunderbird Alumni Association worldwide, an active member of the Thunderbird Alumni Association of San Diego and past officer of the Los Angeles and Phoenix Thunderbird Alumni Association Chapters.