Alison Servi

President Herman-Scheer

Alison Servi builds brands by challenging how they think, not just what they say—and she’s spent her career on both sides of the shopper relationship, advising major retailers and sitting at the brand strategy table.

She’s worked in retail for over a decade, consulting for companies including Target (where she helped shape grocery strategy from Day 1), Best Buy, and REI. That close-up view of how people actually shop now anchors her brand work: she scaled a boutique insights firm from $6M to $40M, then led strategy and insights at Material, where she was brought in to integrate capabilities and push the organization toward a more future-facing model.

Today, Alison is an owner of Herman-Scheer, a brand strategy consultancy focused on helping companies earn a meaningful role in people’s lives. Her perspective is simple: most brands don’t have a relevance problem—they have a clarity and courage problem.

Her work cuts through the noise, aligning brand, experience, and business strategy around real human needs. Drawing on behavioral science and a background in learning and organizational change, she focuses on what actually drives adoption and purchase—designing strategies that don’t just sound right, but change behavior over time. She frames the shopper challenge simply: brands have to be both stoppable and shoppable.

 A sought-after speaker on turning insight into action, Alison most recently took the stage at the 2026 Ignite: CPG conference on data and decision-making. She believes relevance isn’t something you claim—it’s something you prove, daily. She helps brands make that shift