ASI’s Nicole Rollender Honored With Folio: Top Women in Media Award

Wearables editor recognized for publishing creativity and accomplishments

TREVOSE, PA – June 14, 2016 –The Advertising Specialty Institute® (ASI) today announced Wearables® Editor Nicole Rollender has been named one of the 2016 Folio: Top Women in Media. The awards recognize the most influential women in media, those who have fearlessly moved their teams, brands and companies forward, made strides in their respective markets and created lasting impressions on their colleagues.

Rollender was honored in the Rising Stars category along with other women from media companies such as Bloomberg Media, ESPN the Magazine, Forbes and Yahoo at the 2016 Folio: awards luncheon in New York City.

“ASI is incredibly proud of Nicole for earning this prestigious national honor,” said Timothy M. Andrews, president and chief executive officer of ASI. “Nicole is a major force in delivering the very best education and editorial content in the industry, firmly committed to guiding our members to excellence and helping distributors and decorators keep pace with the latest innovations in apparel, screen-printing and embroidery.”

Rollender is editor of ASI’s Wearables, an award-winning, nationally distributed trade magazine. Rollender (@NRollender_ASI) also launched ASI’s professional development program, ASI University, which offers two certification levels: BASI™ (Bachelor of Advertising Specialty Information) and MASI™ (Master of Advertising Specialty Information). To date, over 1,500 have earned their ASI certification, with more than 40,000 enrolled.

Recently, Rollender led the integration of two of ASI’s magazines, Stitches® and Wearables, with the re-imaginedWearables debuting in January 2016.

With this latest honor, Rollender joins a group of the best and brightest rising stars, entrepreneurs, director-level doers, corporate visionaries and industry leaders hand-picked by Folio:, which provides magazine publishing professionals with news, insights and best practices through its magazine, awards programs, webinars, conferences and networking events.

Wearables serves distributors and decorators who sell logoed apparel, providing print and online readers with embroidery and screen-printing content, case studies, business strategies, fashion trends and more. In addition to annual franchise issues like “The State of the Decorated-Apparel Industry,” “The Fashion Issue” and the “Machine Guide,” the magazine creates outreach articles, including its “Can This Shop Be Saved?” series, and educational partnerships with Moore College of Art and Design.

Rollender joined ASI in 2006 to head its apparel- and decoration-centric publications. Under her guidance,Stitches magazine was named Magazine of the Year by ASBPE in 2012 and honored with several Jesse H. Neal Awards.

Rollender’s forward-thinking social media strategy has earned six national awards (ASPBE and Folio: awards, and a Jesse H. Neal finalist, among others), while expanding the magazines’ cyber footprint to Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and Pinterest, and increasing online engagement with readers through blogs, videos, podcasts, online polls and quizzes.

Rollender also developed several educational partnerships, including a pioneering commercial embroidery track to enhance Rhode Island School of Design’s textile program, and a partnership with Babson College that has helped teach hundreds of students about the promotional products industry through small business ventures.
 
The winning editor lives outside of Philadelphia with her husband and two children. Her debut poetry collection, “Louder Than Everything You Love,” was published in 2015.
 
About ASI
The Advertising Specialty Institute (ASI®) serves a network of 25,000 suppliers, distributors and decorators in the $22 billion promotional products industry. ASI’s flagship product, the technology platform ESP®, manages the industry’s entire supply and marketing chain. ASI also produces award-winning digital and print content, live events and educational programs that enable companies in 61 countries to be more efficient, productive and profitable. ASI’s Counselor® magazine provides the most authoritative business content in the industry, and the ASI Certification Program features 500+ live and online education courses for over 40,000 professionals. The company, family owned and operated since 1962, is proud to have been consistently ranked among the “Best Places to Work” in Philadelphia and Bucks County, PA. For more info:www.uat-asicentral.com.