Bills, Bulls and branding

Wanerka joined PepsiCo in March as communications manager for the Gatorade portfolio, where she works on campaigns, product launches, athlete announcements, executive visibility, crisis management and more for brands like Gatorade and Propel.

The company had already begun reviving Gatorade’s classic “Is It In You?” campaign when she arrived, but she’s played a significant role in its execution, working on the earned media strategy for the tagline revival which included coordinating interviews with Gatorade roster athletes like professional basketball players Jayson Tatum and A’ja Wilson, and yes, even Josh Allen.

“We set up a series of behind-the-scenes interviews to capture the making of the “Is It In You?” commercial and these athletes’ excitement to be part of bringing back our most iconic tagline of all time,” says Wanerka. “We know the media landscape is evolving, so for Josh we worked with a media influencer on a fun social-forward interview during his shoot.” 

Wanerka has worked in food PR since she graduated with her dual degree from the School of Management in 2016. She first joined the public relations firm MWWPR in New York City, where she worked on accounts such as Red Lobster and Whole Foods Market, then transitioned to in-house communications teams for Dunkin’ in Boston and McDonald’s in Chicago before landing her current role at PepsiCo.

Wanerka credits the cohort experience in her MBA program for teaching her the importance of teamwork, empathy and leveraging individual strengths.

“One of my former bosses at McDonald’s, who is now a friend, always told me that how you show up at work is just important as what you do,” she says. “And as I reflected, I realized how much I learned about that from working in my MBA group.”

Throughout her academic and professional life, Wanerka’s secret to success has been saying yes to everything — within reason.

“Every experience you can get is going to help you in ways you might not realize in that moment,” she says. “Be open to trying new things that may not seem directly applicable to where you see yourself going.”

Outside the office, Wanerka enjoys a variety of activities, including traveling. At least once a year, she and her husband, Nico, visit his home country of Spain, and they recently returned from a trip to Italy. Together they are avid soccer fans who support FC Barcelona, and she also enjoys hiking, taking advantage of Chicago’s rich food scene and spending time with her mini golden doodle, Cleo.