Roger Gray

Founder, CEO & Chairman
GKV

Roger Gray has spent 37 years growing his full-service advertising business in Baltimore and continuing his and his company’s philanthropic reach in the city.

“One of the principles that I’ve always lived by since I’ve been running this organization for over 36 years is to always give back to the community that you live and work in, and play in for that matter,” Gray says. “I’ve always done a fair amount of philanthropic work with some pretty prestigious nonprofit organizations in the Baltimore region.”

The Daily Record honored Gray with one of its Most Admired CEOs awards in 2012. That year, he was named to The Living Classrooms Foundation’s board of trustees. Since his departure, Gray says, he has developed and updated promotional videos for the group.

The Maryland native has served as a board member for Good Samaritan Foundation, the Mid-Atlantic American Association of Advertising Agencies and Loyola University Maryland, where he received his undergraduate and graduate degrees and where his two sons attend. He also served as board chairperson for the Pride of Baltimore.

GKV (Gray, Kirk and VanSant Advertising, Inc.) employs 75 people; its clients include Bridgestone Golf, McCormick, B&G Foods, Sprint, Constellation, Maryland Lottery and Shentel.

Gray said GKV’s advertising work for the Maryland Lottery helped set record sales for its scratch-off tickets.

“We were able to do that at a time when casinos came into play, and typically when casinos come into play, lottery sales drop,” he says. “But that has not been the case in Maryland.”

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