Board Members
Paddy Davis
APMC Position: Membership Director
Company: Honey+Buzz
Co-founder of Honey+Buzz, Paddy has been creating experiential and digital campaigns for a variety of global brands for the past 10 years. Over that time he has worked with the likes of Heineken, Renault, Nivea and Fanta. Across each of those clients Paddy has steered the strategic and creative approach that has delivered award winning campaigns for his clients. Working across a broad range of clients and disciplines (experiential, sponsorship, shopper marketing, digital) means that Paddy brings an approach that adds value across a variety of different areas within the APMC.
Aoife Butler
APMC Position: Joint Awards Director
Company: Pluto
With a degree in Marketing, Aoife specialises in experiential, promotional and shopper marketing. Starting her career with Runway Marketing, she worked with clients such as Lucozade and Bulmers. Currently Account Director at Pluto, Aoife heads up a number of blue chip brands including Danone, McVitie’s and Unilever.
Valerie Melinn
APMC Position: Chairperson
Company: Verve the Live Agency
Valerie has over 15 years’ marketing experience having worked on both agency and client side during that time. She started her career in Public Relations working with clients such as Eircell, Warner Brothers and L’Oreal before moving into a more marketing and event management focused role with CMS Marketing. She has worked on variety of campaigns for a wide range of clients during her 9 years with CMS Marketing including Samsung, Sony PlayStation, Kelkin and Coors Light. Valerie took up her role as Client Services Director with Verve the Live Agency in 2013. Valerie took on the role of Chairperson of the Association in 2017.
Karleen Smyth
APMC Position: Communications Director
Company: Boys + Girls
Karleen is a Senior Experiential Director with Boys + Girls and has over 10 years experience in the marketing and entertainment industry. Starting her career in PR, she worked on some of the most exciting projects and artists in the Irish entertainment industry, like Electric Picnic, RTE and many more.
Karleen moved into a more events focused role before co-founding boutique events agency Twigged Creative in 2014. From here, Karleen then joined Boys + Girls as Senior Experiential Director focused on bringing powerful brand experiences to life for some great brands such as Three Ireland, Samsung and Ulster Bank.
Sinead Lee
APMC Position: Education Director
Company: BBDO Dublin
Sinead is a Director of BBDO Dublin and has almost 20 years agency experience having joined BBDO (formerly Irish International) as an Account Director to run the Guinness BTL business. Since then she has worked on a broad range of clients from FMCG to utilities, property developers to retail across multiple disciplines; advertising, sponsorship and shopper marketing. Developing award-winning campaigns for both the domestic and pan-European markets.
In 2005 Sinead was appointed to the board and took on the broader responsibility for operations of the agency's BTL business. From this evolved the agency’s impressive Shopper Marketing business; BBDO SHOP which is the function she leads today.
Emma Ross
APMC Position: Sponsorship Director and joint Awards Director
Company: Real Nation
Emma has over 12 years experience in the marketing industry. Starting her career in PR, she worked with clients including Sony PlayStation, AIB on their sponsorship of The Ryder Cup and Centra. Emma moved to a broader Marketing role in 2012, joining Runway Marketing working with clients including C&C Gleeson (Bulmers), Brady Family Ham and Lindt. After spending time in Verve the Live Agency, Emma returned to Runway (now Pluto) as Managing Director in early 2017 before joining Real Nation in May 2019. Emma is delighted to play an active role on the board of the APMC.
Dan Henson
APMC Position: European Director 
Company: APMC
Dan has been creating experiential and promotional ideas in the Irish and international market for almost 20 years.
He began agency life creating integrated campaigns and pop up promotions for Coca-Cola, Nokia, Pot Noodle and Lynx before moving to BBDO where he worked across many brands including their Diageo and Mars portfolios. Dan moved to Boys and Girls in 2015 as Head of Activation where he crafted award winning experiential work for Three Mobile, Proximo, Dulux and Ulster Bank to name but a few.
As the only creative on the APMC Board Dan is helping to realise and encourage the creative standard of work represented by the APMC awards.
Katherine Sheils
APMC Position: Joint Awards Director
Company: Rothco
With a degree in Marketing from DIT Katherine has over 17 years’ experience in agencies in Ireland, UK and Australia. Katherine brings a wealth of through the line and project management experience across a range of industries for national and international brands. Katherine joined the team in Rothco in February 2016 from Target McConnells where she worked on Vodafone Ireland, Carlsberg, Budweiser, Guinness Storehouse and An Post Media, amongst other brands.
Katherine headed up the Heineken, White Claw and mytaxi accounts in Rothco.
