rising tide
“I turned to him and said, ‘This is exactly where I’m going to go to school,’” she says. “I was drawn by how beautiful it was, the culture, the eclectic mix of students – everything about it. I knew instantaneously that this was the place for me.”
When it came time to look at colleges, Campbell didn’t bother applying elsewhere. Her gut feeling as a 9-year-old was reinforced once she was on campus. She recalls a vivid memory after her freshman orientation of happening upon Tracy Chapman performing on campus.
“I remember thinking, This is the most magical place on Earth.”
Initially, she wasn’t as clear on a career path, but a series of positive experiences at the College helped bring her future into focus. Majoring in English laid the foundation for a career that routinely taps her creative side. Campbell particularly remembers history classes taught by Randy Sparks.
“He was so great at storytelling. He definitely stood out.”
Meanwhile, a part-time sales job at Garfield Jewelers, then on King Street, helped develop her business sense. “I really enjoyed solving people’s problems and being part of these special moments in their lives,” she says. “You have this great opportunity to make people happy.”
To this day, Campbell counts proprietors Carol Garfield ’89 and her late father, Allen, among her mentors.
Back on campus, she cultivated leadership skills as vice president of public relations for her sorority, Kappa Alpha Theta. “I had to plan all these events, and I remember gathering the women in the sorority and saying, ‘OK, who’s going to do what, and how is this going to happen?’ and literally delegating it,” she says. “There was a moment when I was like, Wow, this is how it’s done.”
After graduation, Campbell worked in management at Belk and Macy’s, moving around the Southeast with her husband, Michael Campbell ’97, whom she met at the College, and later, with their daughter, Eleanor, now 25. In 2020, eager to learn more about e-commerce after years of running department stores, Campbell landed at Southern Tide as vice president of direct-to-consumer and was promoted to CEO shortly thereafter.
“I’m responsible for leading the brand and ensuring that everything we do – from our product to our customer experience – reflects our brand identity and our core values.”
Since she started, the brand’s retail business has grown from one store to 38. She likes that every day at her job is different.
“I can go from a planning and allocation meeting to a product and marketing meeting,” she says. “And there’s all this creativity. And a lot of analysis. I can’t imagine doing anything else.”