Advertising Professional of the Year

Darrell Durham

2010 Award Recipient

Darrell Durham is market development director for Tucson Newspapers, the agency that handles the business functions of the Arizona Daily Star. Prior to joining TNI in 2004, the Kansas City native served as senior vice president of corporate marketing for the Dispatch Printing Company in Columbus, OH. He began his career as a copy boy with The Kansas City Star and was a contributor to the newspaper's feature sections before relocating to Ohio. He is a graduate of the University of Missouri-Kansas City (BA, English Language and Literature). His lovely daughters, Rachel and Nora, and stunning grandchildren, Nick and Reece, still live in Columbus.

Download Advertising Professional of the Year Nomination Form (MS Word or PDF)

AAF Silver Medal Award

Rich Moret

2010 Award Recipient

Rich grew up in Tucson at a time when you could count the high schools on one hand. And the number of ad agencies on two hands. He graduated from Rincon High in 1964 and spent two years at the U of A - leaving in 1966 to become one of the first VISTA Volunteers. After his year-long stint in New York's Lower East Side, Rich was fortunate enough to be accepted as a transfer student by Amherst College.

At Amherst (the school of Robert Frost and home of Emily Dickinson), Rich won the annual poetry award, practice taught high school English and graduated with a BA in English. In 1969, he moved to Chicago and used his poetry talent to land his first job as an advertising copywriter. Soon after, he was offered a dream copywriting job at an advertising agency in Hawaii - where he was also schooled in account service, media placement and billing. During his five years in the Aloha State, he worked with many hotels and tourist attractions as well as car dealers, developers (Maui's first condominium) and consumer electronics giant Toshiba (for which he created the slogan they used worldwide for over 25 years: "In touch with tomorrow").

In 1975, Rich moved back to Tucson and became Director of Operations for Nordensson Advertising - from which Bill Owens hired him in 1976 to run the Tucson office of Arizona's first statewide advertising agency, Owens & Associates. That office was later to become Owens/Moret and, in 1991, Moret Advertising.

In the 35 years that Rich has been in the advertising business here, he has had the privilege of handling a wide variety of clients - including some "firsts":

• PimaCare - one of the country's first HMO's (and the first to switch from just B2B advertising to consumer advertising - using television).
• Papago Bingo - one of the country's first Indian casinos (and the first casino to "break" the federal statutes against promoting gaming on radio, TV or through the mail).
• Canyon Ranch - one of the world's first spas, part of the early challenge was to communicate to travel agents what a spa was - and why their wealthy clients needed one.
• This was done through the creative use of direct mail - with an invitation to "Send your clients where they'll lose their asses".
• KVOA Eyewitness News - before local stations had in-house promotion directors - and before they thought of hyping news features - Jon Ruby (GM of KVOA) and Rich Moret teamed up (the first in Tucson to put anchors on billboards, ads in TV Guide and shoot on-location videos promoting "provocative" news segments).
• Wood Bros. Homes - the first to put a "life-size" reproduction of a home on billboards (besides winning numerous awards for this, it helped sell a lot of homes).

Other major clients handled over the years include: Estes, Fairfield, Grunewald & Adams, Loews Ventana Canyon, Casino del Sol, Old Tucson, TMC, Biosphere, National Bank of Arizona, MasterCool, Weiser Lock and Jim Click.

Some of the countless boards Rich has served on include: United Way (former Volunteer of the Year), Ad Fed (former Ad Person of the Year), 88-CRIME (former president), Tucson Classics (co-founder of the Michael Landon Celebrity Tennis Classic), Boys Chorus, St. Gregory, Amity, Cystic Fibrosis and Pima Community College Foundation.

Download AAF Silver Medal Award Nomination Form (MS Word or PDF)

Golden Mic Award

Ed Alexander

2010 Award Recipient

Ed has been a fixture on Tucson radio for over 35 years.  A transplant from the Philadelphia area, Ed grew up watching Dick Clark's "Bandstand" every afternoon and listening to Philly, Boston and Chicago radio - and the Beatles landing in NYC. After graduating from Rincon H.S. and a brief stint at the U of A,  Ed started his on-air career at beautiful music KAIR in the early 70's but his love of rock music soon took him to Tucson's original Album Rock station 92.9 KWFM. About a year later, Ed got his first taste of ‘pop' radio at 1330 KHYT playing current hits and oldies.  But his goal was to be a DJ on top rated 99 KTKT - the Lotus Communications Top 40 powerhouse in Southern Arizona. In over 15 years, Ed worked his way from night time DJ to the top rated Morning show with co-hosts Tonie Stanton, Mike Letson, Lee Allen, Thom Boyd and others. His positions in the 70's and 80's included Music Director and Program Director and in the early 80's he helped launch, market and program KTKT-FM now KLPX.

In the 80's Ed branched out into advertising sales and marketing, copywriting and voice work but returned to radio at COOL AM. He hosted the morning show on Cloud 95 (now Mix FM) and became Production Director for Behan/Duchossoisu/Apogee and Journal Broadcasting - 4 owners of 94.9, 1490 and 107.5 - in 4 years.   In the past decade Ed hosted the morning shows on Slone Broadcasting's KTUC and Journal's Mega Oldies and continued in sales, writing and marketing at DigiVideo and KLPX.

Ed has hosted hundreds of local advertiser promotions and charity telethons, walks and fund raising events.  He has served on the board of directors of the Tucson Advertising Federation (now AAF Tucson), March of Dimes, Tucson Classics, United Way Campaign Cabinet, and is a member of Foothills Sertoma and the AAFT Public Council.

Ed is a veteran copywriter, producer and voice talent. He has been the statewide radio voice for the Arizona Theatre Company, National radio voice for Ringling Bros. Circus and national radio voice for the Harlem Globetrotters, 2006 and 2007 seasons.

Currently, Ed is Operations Manager of Good News Radio Broadcasting's AM1030 KVOI and 690 KCEE as well as producer of The Wake Up Tucson show and assistant producer of the Jim Parisi Show on AM1030 KVOI.  You might remember Ed as the Golden Karaoke Master at last year's Addy Awards.

Ed's wife, Julie and step-daughter, Courtney are his motivation to continue to be involved and active at work, church and in the community.

Download Golden Mic Award Nomination Form (MS Word or PDF)

Golden Pen

David Hatfield

2010 Award Recipient

David Hatfield's career in media dates back more than 40 years, starting out as a newspaper "copy boy" (the errand-runner for newspaper reporters) while attending school in San Francisco, part-time radio disc jockey and working on the studio crew at a TV station. He was hired as a reporter by the Arizona Daily Star in 1972 and covered beats including county and state government, politics until the newspaper gave up its "women's section" in 1976 to start a features and entertainment section. That's when he began writing a local media column, something he is still doing to this day.

But there were a couple of interruptions along the way when Hatfield left to go over to the TV side working as promotion manager at KOLD for three years and then 21 years, working under three different ownership groups  at KVOA.

 In 2004, Hatfield was named editor of Inside Tucson Business and AzBiz.com, the region's business news publications.

 Besides his career in Tucson media, Hatfield served on the school board of Catalina Foothills School District No. 16, first elected in 1990 and was part of the group pushing for construction of that district's high school. He remains involved and continues to write a monthly column for The DesertLeaf.

Hatfield has been married for 33 years, has a daughter, two sons, a son-in-law and is looking forward to a second grandchild this summer.

Download Golden Pen Nomination Form (MS Word or PDF)

Phyllis Ehlinger Women of Excellence

Robyn Frey & Carol Zimmerman

2010 Award Recipients

Robyn Frey

Robyn has a creative sense that naturally permeates her entire life. It's not just the look that's distinctly hers. It's the words and images, and what they communicate to audiences. This combination of art and words is what Robyn is all about. Whether she is working with her design team, talking to Pima Community College students or volunteering with non-profit organizations, her question is one and the same "What does this mean?"

She exemplifies the term "communicator" in her ability to take an idea and turn it into a message that's compelling and memorable. And she has fun doing it.

Robyn's unique strength is that she always has a new and different perspective that becomes the essence for one stand alone advertisement or an entire advertising campaign.

As a result Robyn and her creative staff have won numerous advertising awards in an array of media over the years.   

A native of North Carolina, Robyn has a BA in Graphic Design from the University of Georgia. She was an artist for the University Of Georgia College Of Veterinary Medicine and served as Art Director at Bernard Hodes Advertising before joining Bolchalk FReY in 1981.

Carol Zimmerman joined Zimmerman & Associates in 2000 after amassing a wealth of experience in political campaign management, social services, government and fundraising development.

Immediately upon graduation from the University of Arizona, she successfully applied for a federal grant that helped her found New Directions for Young Women, a counseling and advocacy agency for juvenile female offenders.

In 1984, she assumed the position as chief of staff for Tucson City Councilmember and later Mayor Tom Volgy. Her duties included media relations, policy development and supervision of constituent services. After the Mayor retired from public office, she joined the staff of St. Gregory College Preparatory School where she served as director of development. There, she spearheaded the school's annual fund campaign and successfully completed a $4.7 million capital campaign.

In 2002, Ms. Zimmerman was elected to the Central Arizona Water Conservation Board of Directors and re-elected to a second term in 2008. This 15-member unpaid board governs the policies and operations of the Central Arizona Project (CAP).

Carol has served in variety of positions in local and state political campaigns over the last 30-years, including spearheading the Zimmerman & Associates team in the very successful effort to pass the Regional Transportation Authority Plan and ½-cent sales tax election and JTED.

Carol has served on many non-profit boards with a particular love for those serving women and children. She is married to Peter Zimmerman.  Their son Colin, and his wife Leslie, have one daughter , 3 year-old Isabella.

Download Phyllis Ehlinger Women of Excellence Nomination Form (MS Word or PDF)