When picturing her future professional career as she went through college, Avery Chappell saw herself pursuing nursing. “I didn’t know that marketing was going to be what I loved,” she explains. A Mobile native, she first dipped her toes in the industry with a job in Orange Beach at WhipTale Digital, a small agency created by friend and former co-worker Rebecca Chapman.
“I started learning a little bit of everything,” Chappell says, such as overseeing client onboarding, assisting with SEO and website construction, managing social media, and writing blogs. This was the first of a series of steppingstones for Chappell as her career moved into more creative roles with social media and digital content.
“I’ve always been a very creative person,” she says. “[When] I started writing, I started to learn more about marketing, and it was the perfect career path for me.” From WhipTale, she worked her way up to bigger agencies and higher titles, later landing a role as brand manager for Orange Beach’s Compass Media LLC before moving to Visit Mobile.
“Working at a bigger agency [like] Compass Media … got my foot in the door in tourism and working to promote visiting the Gulf Coast and Alabama beaches,” Chappell says. While she emphasizes that her work in Orange Beach helped her realize she loves marketing, her heart was always in Mobile. “I grew up here, graduated high school here, went to college here—so when this position became open with Visit Mobile, I knew that … promoting my home would be [perfect].”
As Visit Mobile’s social media and digital content manager since last December, Chappell connects out-of-towners with the Southern charm and rich past of Mobile. “Mobile has a little bit of something for everyone,” she notes, describing the city’s walkable entertainment district and numerous shops, museums, restaurants, and historical landmarks. “From growing up here, I remember riding my bike to Cammie’s Old Dutch, an amazing, old, historic ice cream shop, which is still around today. Showing why I love Mobile and being able to put that out there for the rest of the world to see—that’s what I’m most proud of.”
