Backbone Scales Media Practice with Integrated and Growth Marketing Leadership and AI Investments

Carbondale, Colo. – November 9, 2026 – Backbone, a marketing agency specializing in outdoor and active lifestyle brands, is expanding its media practice with new leadership and deeper AI integrations. 

Backbone’s approach to media is evolving 

While most marketing discourse pits brand against performance media, Backbone's core philosophy of BCP (Brand, Community, Performance) adds a third leg to the stool. Community is the root system that gives brands a strong foundation as brand and performance media help them grow taller and broader. Performance-focused agencies aren't unique. Neither are agencies built for global scale, nor boutique shops that connect with niche communities. What's rare is bringing deep community connections, brand-building scale and commerce-driven performance together under one roof. 

“That model matters more now than ever,” said Charlie Lozner, vice president of media at Backbone. “The industry’s largest networks are merging for scale and AI is reshaping how agencies work. The question brands are asking has gotten more fundamental: who actually knows our audience, not just our data? Our evolving media practice is an answer to that question.” 

New leadership across Backbone’s media practice 

Vanessa Allen joins as senior director of media, and Chris Gibbons joins as director of performance media. They follow Nicole Stahlecker, who joined as media director earlier this year. These hires support a booming media business at Backbone, with total media spend jumping more than 200% YoY and total Backbone media fees up 95% from last year. 

Allen brings a mix of agency, technology and brand-side experience to an integrated senior leadership role focused on making paid media the connective tissue that supports everything else a brand is doing across the marketing ecosystem. “Integration gets talked about a lot and practiced a lot less,” said Allen. “PR, creators, events, AEO, and paid all compete for attention, and too often these services run on separate plans with separate goals. Real integration builds one plan, one story, and drives every channel in the same direction, while paid informs how that story scales. Bringing an integrated lens to Backbone will help enhance what our full-service teams are building.” 

Gibbons brings more than 15 years in growth and performance marketing across global agencies, REI and consulting, with a focus on tying media investment to customer economics and profitable growth. “I'm excited to join Backbone at a moment when its media business is clearly evolving,” said Gibbons. “The work I care about connects media investment to customer and product economics, so when a client's CFO asks what the budget bought them, there is a real answer, and it’s in their language. That is where growth marketing earns a seat at the table.” 

Investments in analytics and applied AI 

Daniel Caponetti, formerly Backbone’s director of data and analytics, has been elevated to senior director of analytics and applied AI, a role created to implement unique AI infrastructure that connects the agency’s category-leading data and insights to media planning and measurement, among other service lines. 

The agency’s approach to AI is defined by Authentic Intelligence. Backbone is a human-first agency that uses artificial intelligence to scale its expertise at a level and pace that was previously not possible. Backbone’s value comes from its connection to the brands and communities it serves, and from the judgment and intuition that come with it. 

“We know our categories in the most human way possible,” said Caponetti. “That experience impacts every strategy and can never be artificially imitated. To connect with our clients’ customers, we need to come from a place of authenticity. Yet, extending knowledge and scaling our capabilities with AI has been a priority for the last several years. Generic AI produces generic work, so we’ve built custom context layers that connect AI to specific brand knowledge, audience information, category research, performance data and our own strategic thinking. Every output starts from relevant context and ends with human judgement, which means our sharpest thinking is available across the agency instead of living with one strategist.” 

Standardized AI access, shared workspaces and cross-platform context layers are live across Backbone’s teams. Agentic workflows and conversational reporting are in progress.

To learn more about Backbone’s media capabilities, email info@backbone.media.