Contact

The Center for Retailing Studies’ is committed to retailing education, service and research.  We invite you to visit or contact us to learn more about our programs.

Center for Retailing Studies
Mays Business School
Texas A&M University
4112 TAMU
College Station, TX 77843-4112
Phone:  (979) 845-0325
Fax:  (979) 845-5117
Location on campus:  Suite 201, Wehner Building

CRS Team

Cheryl Holland Bridges
Director, Executive Professor
c-bridges@mays.tamu.edu 

Cheryl Holland Bridges, Director of the Center for Retailing Studies, brings over 25 years experience as a senior executive in the retail industry to Mays Business School and Texas A&M University. She also serves as an executive professor teaching marketing 425, retail merchandising and marketing 485, directed studies. Prior to joining Texas A&M University Cheryl served as Senior Vice President of Merchandising for luxury Internet retailer, Ashford.com. Prior to joining Ashford.com, Cheryl served as Sr. Vice President of merchandising for two divisions of Federated Department Stores, now Macy's, and specialty store chains Rodier Paris and Halls, a division of Hallmark Cards. She also served as Sr. Vice President of fashion merchandising and product development for the New York corporate office of BATUS stores which included Saks Fifth Avenue and Marshall Field. Cheryl Bridges has been quoted in trade and press publications including the Wall Street Journal, Forbes, and the New York Times, USA Today and Women's Wear Daily. Cheryl is an honor graduate of Texas Woman's University, and has received the University's Distinguished Alumna Award. She is also a member of Fashion group International; the American Collegiate Retailing Association; the Retail Executive Association; the Associations of Former Students of both Texas Woman's University and Texas A&M University. She is an advisor to the M.B. Zale Leadership Scholars and serves as an ATMentor. In 2009 Bridges received the Association of Former Students of Texas A&M University Distinguished Achievement Award for teaching excellence in Mays Business School. Cheryl also was received the Texas A&M University Distinguished Achievement in Teaching Award in 2012.

Venky Shankar
Professor of Marketing, Holder of the Coleman Chair in Marketing and CRS Research Director
vshankar@mays.tamu.edu

Venkatesh (Venky) Shankar is Professor of Marketing and Coleman Chair in Marketing at the Mays Business School, Texas A&M University. His areas of specialization include Digital Business, Competitive Strategy, International Marketing, Innovation, New Product Management, Pricing, Retailing, and Branding.

Shankar has a Ph.D. in marketing from the Kellogg Graduate School of Management, Northwestern University and has corporate experience in the areas of marketing and international business development. He has worked in diverse countries.

Shankar has won awards from such sources as the American Marketing Association (AMA) and the Marketing Science Institute. He has published in academic journals such as the Journal of Marketing Research, Management Science, Marketing Science, Strategic Management Journal, Journal of Marketing, Journal of Public Policy and Marketing, and Journal of Retailing and in business periodicals such as Wall Street Journal and Financial Times. He is a winner of the 2006 Robert Clarke Award for the Outstanding Direct and Interactive Marketing Educator, 2001 IBM Faculty Partnership Award, the 1999 Paul Green Award for the Best Article in Journal of Marketing Research, and the 2000 Don Lehman Award for the Best Dissertation-based Article in an AMA journal. He was a Faculty Fellow of the 1999, 2000, 2003, 2004, 2005 and 2007 Doctoral Consortia, and the 2001 e-Commerce Consortium of the AMA. He is Co-Editor of the Journal of Interactive Marketing and is an Academic Trustee of the Marketing Science Institute (MSI). He is also on the editorial boards of Marketing Science, the International Journal of Research in Marketing, Journal of Retailing and the Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science. He has delivered over 100 presentations in countries ranging from Australia to the Netherlands. He is a three-time winner of the Krowe Award for Teaching and has taught Marketing Management, Digital Business Strategy, Competitive Marketing Strategy, and International Marketing.  He was a visiting scholar at the Sloan School of Management, MIT.  He has also been a visiting faculty at INSEAD, Singapore Management University, SDA Bocconi, the Chinese European International Business School at Shanghai, and the Indian School of Business. Business 2.0 listed him as one of two key professors at the University of Maryland.

Shankar has consulting or executive training experience with organizations such as Allstate, Fannie Mae, GlaxoSmithKline, Hewlett Packard, IBM, Intel, Lockheed Martin, Lucent Technologies, Marriott International, Northrop Grumman, PepsiCo, Philips, and Volvo. He has made several appearances on CNN, C-SPAN, Voice of America and GreatIdeasRadio. He has been on advisory boards including IBM’s e-Business Conference Advisory Committee, Technology Entrepreneur Community Center, European e-Business Center, ESSEC, France, and Ingenium Corporation. He is a Fellow of the e-Business Research Center at Penn State University. He has served as an expert witness in legal cases..

Kelli G. Hollinger
Associate Director, Lecturer
khollinger@tamu.edu

Kelli Hollinger promotes the Center for Retailing Studies to a national audience of retailers and students through media contacts, print publications, social media, and the Center's websites, crstamu.org and retailingsummit.org. CRS corporate partners know her as a primary contact to help develop their campus recruitment strategy and sponsor relationship with Mays Business School.  She manages speaker coordination, site design, contracts, and staging for the Retailing Summit and other on-campus programs. She is the also the advisor for the CRS internship program and teaches MKTG 484 Internship every semester.

Kelli graduated from the Honors College at Louisiana State University and completed her Master's of Arts in History at Texas A&M University. She began her career at Texas A&M as a teaching assistant, and enjoyed mentoring young students.  In 2001, she joined the Memorial Student Center's Forsyth Center Galleries, where she served as program and marketing coordinator, and as advisor for two student committees.  The MSC focuses on developing the leadership potential of Aggies.

She is a ten year member of the Junior League of Bryan-College Station, serving on the board and volunteering more than 100 hours a year.

Regina Gomez
Program Coordinator
rgomez@tamu.edu

Born in Colombia and bi-lingual, Regina Gomez immigrated to the United States in 2000. She earned a bachelor’s degree in General Management from Western Kentucky University, and began her career with the Human Resources Office for the City of Bowling Green, KY. Regina joined Texas A&M University’s Office of International Outreach in 2009. As administrative assistant, she managed all budget preparation and bill reconciliation. She was responsible for program logistics, and successfully planned many seminars and conferences.

Regina uses her passion for cultural awareness to volunteer with the Brazos Valley Worldfest. She also worked with the Texas A&M’s European Union Center organizing events, such as the Energy Symposium. At the Center for Retailing Studies, Regina will coordinate the Retailing Career Fairs, Executive Professor teaching program, student travel, and Retailing Summit event logistics. She serves as advisor to the100-member Student Retailing Association and CRS office manager.