Red Ventures

Red Ventures

Type	Privately held
Founded	Charlotte, North Carolina (2000)
Headquarters	Indian Land, South Carolina
Key people	Ric Elias,[1] Chief Executive Officer Dan Feldstein, Chief Marketing Officer Mark Brodsky
Services	Online marketing services Customer acquisition marketing
Number of employees	3,600
Website	www.redventures.com

Red Ventures is an American marketing company incorporated in the State of South Carolina.^[2] The company acquires customers for brands in the home services, financial services, and healthcare industries.^[3]

Red Ventures’ corporate headquarters are located in Indian Land, South Carolina,^[4] with offices also in Charlotte, North Carolina's University City.^[5] Red Ventures also has an office in Sao Paulo, Brazil, and an office in London, UK. In 2015, Red Ventures acquired marketing firm Imagitas in Waltham, Massachusetts^[6]. In 2017, Red Ventures acquired Bankrate for $1.24B^[7] (based in New York City) and Atlanta-based Allconnect, a marketing partner for utilities and energy companies^[8].

The company had additional locations in Miramar, Florida and San Antonio, Texas until 2014 when these locations were closed and the jobs were moved to Charlotte.^[9] According to the Charlotte Business Journal, Red Ventures offered to relocate almost 300 employees to the Charlotte area from Miami and San Antonio when the closures occurred.^[10] Red Ventures also closed an office in Wilmington, NC, moving the jobs to the Indian Land, South Carolina headquarters and relocating many employees.^[11]

Vertical markets

Red Ventures partners with national brands in the following vertical markets:^[12]

• Telco
• Finance
• Retail
• Education
• Industrial
• Pharma
• Insurance
• Security
• Movers

DIRECTV Online Sales

As of 2017, Red Ventures' "Direct Star TV" brand remains the only DirecTV dealer allowed to market and sell DirecTV services online through paid search and holds an exclusive contract with AT&T (DirecTV's parent company) to market its services online. As a result, Red Ventures is DirecTV's largest dealer and sells over 20,000 subscriptions per month.^[13] Red Ventures DirecTV campaigns consistently rank as the top paid search result, as well as organic search result through the company's directvdeals.com website.^[14]

Brief history

• 1999: Red F, the precursor to Red Ventures, was founded by Ric Elias and Dan Feldstein, who met while working at Cendant Corporation.^[15]
• 2000: Following the dot-com implosion of mid-2000, Red F, which began as an online discount and loyalty program, evolved into a marketing consulting firm.
• 2003: Red Ventures is launched—The idea behind it was to acquire new customers on behalf of service-related brands, beginning with DIRECTV (DirectstarTV brand).^[16]
• 2004-2008: Noted as one of the fastest growing private companies.^{[17][18][19][20]}
• 2005: Red F was sold to its management team so Elias and Feldstein could focus on developing Red Ventures^[15]
• 2005: Security Choice (ADT Dealer) business launches at RV.^[21]
• 2007: In April, RV relocates to new, larger headquarters in Charlotte, NC ^[22]
• 2008: Red Ventures acquired Modern Consumer, which operates a lead generation and distribution network for the automotive finance market;^[23]
• 2009: In December, RV headquarters move from Charlotte, NC, 5 miles south to Indian Land, SC.^[22]
• 2010: Red Ventures breaks ground on new building called RV2 in July ^[24]
• 2010: Investment firm General Atlantic announces investment in Red Ventures, and Managing Director Anton Levy joins the board of directors.^[25][26][27]
• 2011: March - RV CEO Ric Elias gives TED Talk on his Hudson River plane crash, which received more than 6 million views and attracts national attention.^[28]
• 2011: Red Ventures hits 1,000 employee mark.
• 2012: RV acquires www.homeinsurance.com and with it a satellite office in Wilmington, NC.^[29]
• 2012: October - Ric Elias launches a scholarship for high-performing undocumented students called Golden Door Scholars, seeding it with 1 million dollars of his own money.^[30]
• 2013: In April, RV breaks ground on headquarters expansion to building three (RV3).^[31]
• 2013: July - RV signs lease for 35,000 sq ft expansion in the University Area of Charlotte, NC.^[32]
• 2014: RV awarded JDIG job development grant from the state of North Carolina for its North Charlotte growth.^[33]
• 2014: RV hits 2,000 employee mark.^[34]
• 2014: June - 180,000 sq ft headquarters expansion on Indian Land, SC opens for business.^[34]
• 2015: Silver Lake announces $250M strategic investment in Red Ventures.^[35]
• 2015: October - RV announces $15MM Strategic Investment in Ampush, a social media advertiser.^[36]
• 2015: November - Red Ventures breaks ground on 300,000 sq ft expansion in Indian Land, SC^[37]
• 2015: May - Red Ventures acquires Boston-based company Imagitas from Pitney Bowes for $310M.^[38]
• 2016: Red Ventures invests $4M in CourseHorse, an online education startup.^[39]
• 2016: Red Ventures acquires Seattle-based Soda.com^[40]
• 2017: Red Ventures acquires Choose Energy^[41]
• 2017: Red Ventures acquires Allconnect^[42]
• 2017: Red Ventures acquires BankRate, Inc.^[43]

Corporate culture

Red Ventures’ corporate culture combines a focus on measurement and profitability with an entrepreneurial mindset that promotes new ideas and innovation from its employees.^[15] The organization is flat, with decision-making dispersed among small, autonomous divisions formed around the company's verticals and marketing channels.^{[44] [45]} and amenities such as an indoor basketball court, a bowling alley, putting greens, a beer garden, and gourmet cafeterias.^[46] Correspondingly, Red Ventures has been repeatedly recognized by Charlotte-based newspapers for its corporate culture.^{[47][48][49][50][51]}

References

Red Ventures is sometimes referred to as RedVentures.