🔒Glastonbury marketing agency Cronin approaches 8 decades in business with new HQ, leadership team

A Glastonbury advertising and marketing firm continues to evolve and grow through nearly eight decades of economic ups and downs, having built a new leadership team and moved its headquarters in the past few months.

In January, Cronin promoted Sean Folan to president and chief operating officer, and Elizabeth Proctor to executive vice president of account service, strategy and digital.

A few months earlier, in November, the firm relocated its headquarters to a 10,000-square-foot, second-floor space it renovated in a 30,000-square-foot office building at 300 Winding Brook Drive in Glastonbury.

Cronin Chairman and CEO Mark Demuro purchased the office building last June for $2.65 million.

Revenue for the 52-employee company, which was founded in 1947 in Hartford, grew 23% last year, said Demuro, who was formerly president of Southport marketing firm Horizon Group North America, which purchased Cronin in 2020 for an undisclosed sum.

Demuro said he bought Cronin because he saw its growth potential as a full-service marketing firm.

Over the past five years, Demuro said he has invested in the company to support market changes and expand its staff and resources, in addition to rebuilding its C-suite.

In 2023, Cronin was the second-largest ad agency in Greater Hartford, recording $74.2 million in gross billings, according to Hartford Business Journal’s Book of Lists.

“We have a leadership group here that is fully aligned behind what we’re trying to achieve for our clients,” Folan said. “The magic there is really about trying to think of and deliver creative ways to break through the clutter in the marketplace.”

One recent Cronin campaign that broke through the clutter was a commercial produced for Illinois-based life insurance company Modern Woodmen, which integrates two 19th-century cowboy pioneers at a campfire with a modern-day family.

Modern Woodmen traces its founding to 1883.

“We leaned into the company’s history to tell a story about today’s true pioneers — hardworking moms who want the best for their families, but were largely ignored by other life insurance companies,” Demuro said. “The results include a 27% year-over-year increase in life insurance applications, as well as huge growth in brand awareness and engagement.”

The campaign won Best of Show at the 2024 CT Ad Club Awards and a Golden Globey for Most Creative at the Advertising & Marketing Independent Network Worldwide Global Conference in San Francisco.

Cronin’s other clients include the state of Connecticut, Women’s Health Connecticut and Connecticut Orthopaedics. It also provides advertising and marketing services to Travelers Cos., the National Coast Guard Museum and Finnish dairy producer Valio.

Experienced leadership team

Cronin was founded in 1947 in Hartford by Bill Cronin Sr., who sold the business in the early 1980s to his son, Bill Cronin Jr.

The son moved the firm to Glastonbury, and eventually sold the business in 2008 to employees Kim Manning and Steve Wolfberg, who turned over the company to Demuro in 2020. Manning and Wolfberg retired from the business in 2021.

Folan, who lives in Bethel, joined Cronin in 2021 as senior vice president of the health division, before becoming executive vice president and chief operating officer in 2023 and, most recently, being appointed the firm’s president and COO in 2025.

Previously, he held leadership roles in marketing and strategy for Procter & Gamble, Cadbury Beverages, McKinsey, Futurebrand and Lieberman Research Worldwide.

Proctor joined the company as senior vice president and head of account service in 2017, before assuming the role of executive vice president this year.

She previously served as an account director for Hill Holiday, ICF Next, BBDO Worldwide and 22squared.

Demuro, a Fairfield County native who now lives in the Connecticut town of Lebanon, began his marketing career at PepsiCo in 1990, after graduating from the University of Pennsylvania.

He and Folan previously worked together in 2010 and 2011 at Westport marketing firm MCA Works. Folan served as executive director, while Demuro worked as a consultant.

Demuro founded Horizon Group North America in 2011, folding the business into Cronin in 2020.

Pulling ‘multiple levers’

Given the fractured media environment, it’s become more challenging to reach the right customers at the right time with the right messaging.

To do it successfully, Demuro said, requires leveraging significantly more advertising channels compared to a decade ago.

“Social media is a big part of this, but not the only part; connected TV, streaming services, influencer marketing, e-commerce channels all contribute to the fragmented landscape,” he said. “We have to pull multiple levers to ensure the experience for customers is consistent throughout the entire cycle.”

Cronin is broadening how it provides advertising and marketing for clients, whether it be via social media or with some help from artificial intelligence, Folan said.

“Meta Platforms are huge for us — Facebook and Instagram,” he said.

Demuro said Cronin’s staff uses a subscriber-based, closed-loop AI platform that helps inspire new ideas and report and summarize data.

“We do not expect AI to replace human creativity and innovation, but it is a tool to help spark creativity and innovation,” he said. “We continuously embrace new technology and look for ways for it to enhance our work.”

Cronin also provides advertising and marketing through TikTok and Instacart, the online grocery delivery service, to drive consumers to consumer packaged-goods brands.

Changing workplace

Adapting to new technologies is key for any advertising and marketing firm that wants to withstand the test of time, said Bennie Johnson, CEO of the American Marketing Association.

“Ultimately, you don’t experience 78 years of success by yourself,” he told the Hartford Business Journal. “It’s about being flexible, adaptable and anticipating the needs of the business, and caring about your client’s business, too.”

What’s also evolved for Cronin is its office space needs.

As part of its move to a new headquarters, Cronin shrunk its office footprint from 19,000 square feet to 10,000 square feet.

Demuro said the firm cut its space in half because it has embraced a hybrid work model — 43 employees come in only three days a week, while nine others work remotely from other areas of the country.

“The workplace has changed,” he said.

Folan said Cronin’s old Glastonbury headquarters provided a traditional office space with lots of offices.

“Everybody had their own office,” he said. “What we’re trying to do here is to create more of an open environment, to really enable and cultivate more cross-functional collaboration among the group.”