March 29, 2024

Up Front - The Publisher's Column

A Welcome Addition

David Denor | 1/20/2022

As you may recall from my November column, Mark Howard, our distinguished executive editor of 26 years, will be retiring from Florida Trend at the end of March.

Mark has been an amazing brand ambassador for our organization. Florida Trend would not be where it is today if it were not for Mark’s journalistic expertise.

But as we say goodbye to Mark, we are equally excited to welcome Florida Trend’s new executive editor, Vickie Chachere.

Finding Mark’s replacement was quite a task. We set out to find someone with strong editorial integrity and solid skills, a proven leader among peers, someone wellversed in all things Florida — from political, public policy and government affairs and business matters to state history and geography. Equally as important, we searched for someone with the right personality and demeanor, someone who would be a great fit for the company’s culture.

I am thrilled to share that we have found all of this and more in Vickie.

Most recently, Vickie was director of strategic communications at the Office of Research and Innovation at the University of South Florida. She started at USF in 2008 as a news manager, moved to director of special projects at the Office of the President then, in 2016, assumed her most recent role there.

Prior to her time at USF, Vickie spent five years as a supervisory correspondent in Florida for the Associated Press — where she was recognized as a Pulitzer Prize finalist for public service as a member of the AP team that covered the 2000 presidential election re-count.

Vickie also spent 14 years at the Tampa Tribune, holding numerous roles — from a reporter covering health care, the Legislature, local politics and criminal and civil courts to an editorial writer for nearly three years, a position that required researching, writing and editing pieces for the Tribune’s editorial and commentary sections.

Vickie holds a bachelor’s in journalism from the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication at Arizona State University and a graduate certificate in globalization studies from the College of Arts and Sciences at USF.

Vickie and Mark will work together over the next couple of months to ensure a smooth transition.

I leaned heavily on Mark while searching for his replacement, relying on his judgment and expertise. Obviously, we could not be more thrilled that Vickie will be taking the reins of the editorial department. She is the right person to lead it forward.

Please help me in welcoming Vickie as Florida Trend’s new executive editor. Her e-mail is vchachere@floridatrend.com.

— David Denor, Publisher
[ddenor@floridatrend.com]

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