Senior VP Acquires Partnership and Equity At Dallas Marketing Communications Firm
DALLAS–Bustin & Co. broadened its management base last week, naming senior vice president Blair Franklin a partner in the 3-year-old marketing consulting and communications firm.
Franklin said he received an undisclosed equity stake in the Dallas shop, which reports annual fee income of $5 million and a staff of 46.
Greg Bustin, founder and president, said Franklin’s appointment was part of a long-term plan put in place when the company opened in July 1994. Franklin will share the partner designation with Bustin and Robert Largen, who merged his marketing consulting practice with Bustin’s last year. Bustin & Co.’s clients include Nextel, Texas Utilities and Mrs Baird’s Bakeries.
Bustin said Franklin has had a growing hand in the shop’s operations and finances, tasks he will continue to spearhead in addition to his existing client service duties.
Bustin and Franklin first met in 1986 at Tracy-Locke (now DDB Needham). They later joined forces in 1990 at Edelman Public Relations in Dallas, where Bustin was executive vice president and general manager and Franklin was vice president, charged with building EPR’s financial communications and research practices.
Franklin’s rise to partner comes on the heels of Bustin’s late 1997 appointment of two vice presidents: Mary Rose Covington and Rob Wilson. Those hires were part of a year-long effort to add experience to the company’s senior-level management, Bustin said.
Bustin Taps Franklin
