We’ll Miss You, Glenda

By Frank Ruggiero

Glenda Simmons styled hair for years before becoming well known and loved as a person who could help businesses style their advertising campaigns.

After 25 years as a marketing consultant with Mountain Times Publications, Simmons decided it was time for a change and tendered her resignation.

Glenda Simmons holds a basketball signed by her co-workers at Mountain Times Publications. Photo by Marie Freeman

As she leaves the office for the last time Wednesday, Feb. 28, she’ll likely recall her first day at the Watauga Democrat.

In 1982, Simmons was working as a hairdresser with her aunt. Watauga Democrat pressman Nick Williams would bring his mother to the beauty shop, and one day told Simmons the paper needed a part-time inserter.

“I was only working part-time at the shop, and thought, ‘We’ll, that’d be fun,’” Simmons said.

Shortly after her arrival, management needed a salesperson to sell real estate classifieds, and Simmons was named for the task. She began to make her mark downtown, selling ads and developing rapport and relationships with her clientele.

In the 1980s, selling ads included building ads, and Simmons would have to physically paste the advertisements together, granting her creative license. Rather than designing hair, she designed ads. She recalls having to shoot tiny pictures of clients’ merchandise, which Williams would subsequently have to shoot to fit the advertisement.

Some of Simmons’ first clients were Coe Insurance, K-Mart, Hunt’s Department Store and Mast General Store, which provided an ample number of tiny pictures for crafty cutting-and-pasting.

“I enjoyed the work,” she said. “You get to know all the people, know all about their families, and you become like family to them. You don’t just go in selling ads — you talk about their family and catch up on the news.”

That aspect was Simmons’ favorite, though she also enjoyed submitting a regular cooking column for the Democrat. Though recipes also change, marketing ads nowadays is considerably different.

In the early 1980s, she sold for the Democrat, Blowing Rocket and Avery Journal. Now, under the Mountain Times Publications umbrella, she sells for those, as well as The Mountain Times and numerous special publications.

And gone are the days of literal cut-and-paste ad layout.

“Now it’s mostly computers — just bring in the ads, give them to graphics, and they do it all on computer,” Simmons said.

Simmons is not quite certain what she’ll do after leaving, but is confident there is something out there for her. At the very least, she has plenty of friends to visit.

“My clients hate to see me go, and I know I’ll miss them,” she said. “I’ll miss all the people here, all my friends. It feels like I’m leaving my family, with all these years working with them. Some of the young people here seem like my children, after working with them for a while. We’ve all had a great relationship — everybody works well together.”

Simmons is being succeeded by Deck Moser, who will assume Simmons’ duties on the 28th. Moser acknowledged he has some big shoes to fill (not literally), but he looks forward to picking up where Simmons left off.

“There’s no way I can replace someone who’s been here 25 years, so I’ll just do the best I can,” he said. “I’ve met a lot of people Glenda worked with, so it’s just a matter of meeting everyone else.”

Charlie Price, advertising director, hopes Simmons will grace the office with frequent visits. “We’re sorry to see Glenda leave, but understand and appreciate her devotion to other priorities,” he said. “Glenda has provided unequaled customer service and is the most dependable consultant that I’ve seen. We’ll certainly miss Glenda’s performance but, most of all, we’ll miss Glenda.”