Rick Sterling -
Sterling-Rice Group
For thirty five years, Rick has been working in the area of brand strategy and innovation. Starting in food retailing in Boston, he then spent nearly ten years in brand management with Quaker Oats in Chicago, and then three years as head of marketing for Celestial Seasonings in the early '80s.
It was his very diverse marketing experience with sophisticated, consumer packaged goods firms such as Quaker Oats, coupled with his very entrepreneurial experience of Celestial Seasonings that shaped the beginnings of Sterling-Rice Group.
Rick and Michael Rice formed the Sterling-Rice Group in 1984, here in Boulder. Rick and Michael worked together in Chicago and then again in Boulder at Celestial Seasonings. Their initial premise was that both large and small firms would be interested in the pair's experience in both sophisticated and entrepreneurial marketing environments. Twenty-two years later and now with over one hundred employees, Sterling-Rice Group has become one of the country's leading integrated brand development firms recognized for the fusion of strategy and creativity. Sterling-Rice Group's clients today include a collection of international and local firms. Nationally, clients include Pepsi, Kraft, General Mills, Kellogg's, Starbucks, Annie's Homegrown, Arrow ECS, Bernina sewing machines, Bayer Pharmaceutical, and the Almond Board of California. Local firms include Frontier Airlines, bioscience firms Efficas and Sciona, Noodles and Company, CollegeInvest, and Horizon Organic Dairy.
Rick has been deeply involved in the community since forming Sterling-Rice Group. Since the beginning, the company has committed to giving at least 10% of its operating income in cash and pro bono labor to local nonprofits. Rick has been a longtime president and board member of the Family Learning Center, a trustee with the Community Foundation and a past winner of the Pen Tate Humanitarian Award.
Susan, his wife of 33 years, has been an active volunteer in the Boulder Valley Schools and is now training her sixth guide dog for the blind. Rick and Susan have three children, all working or in school.
To learn about more about Boulder's 'New Pioneers', check out our previous Award Winners page.
