Meet Our Team
Laston Charriez
Since April 2022, Laston Charriez is an Assistant Professor of Practice and Industry Liaison at the Colorado State University SPUR Campus in Denver Colorado. He is teaching a new Masters in Agribusiness and Food Innovation at CSU’s SPUT Campus.
He is also a digital marketing expert and was hired to teach Digital Marketing at University of Miami in September 2020.
Laston Charriez Bio
Before that, Laston was the Head of Marketing at Pilgrim’s Pride. In this role Laston was responsible of creating the Marketing Department for this $12 B company. Pilgrim’s is the largest Chicken company in the World. Laston launched the “Who makes your food campaign” that propelled Just Bare to market leadership in Minnesota and St. Louis. He also worked with Amazon and made Just Bare Chicken the #1 chicken on Amazon.
Before that he was Chief Product & Marketing Officer Denver Mattress. Before Denver Mattress, Laston worked for four years as Senior Vice President of Marketing & Product Americas at Western Union. In this role Laston lead all Marketing activities for Western Union U.S., Canada, Puerto Rico, Mexico, and the rest of Latin America. Before this role, Laston was VP of Insights & Innovation at Sara Lee North America. In that role Laston oversaw consumer insights, analytics, and platform innovation. His team drove external focus, support the business units with the voice of the consumer and deep analytics, while developing the next innovation platforms across all Sara Lee brands.
He started his professional career in Puerto Rico P&G Marketing Department, and then was promoted to Brand Manager in P&G Central America based in Guatemala. He was later transferred to Mexico and then back to Puerto Rico. In 2000 Laston became the Marketing Director of Charmin & Puffs in North America based in Cincinnati. In this job Laston developed innovative and holistic marketing strategies for Charmin North America including: The Charmin State Fair Program, the Charmin “potty Pollloza” mobile restroom tour, and the first P&G commercial aired in the Superbowl (a Commercial for Charmin).
Laston Charriez has a bachelor’s degree in Marketing from Purdue University, Cum Laude, and a Master’s in Business Administration from Purdue University.
Gregory Graff
Gregory Graff, professor of the economics of innovation and entrepreneurship in the Department of Agricultural and Resource Economics, is a globally recognized expert on intellectual property rights, technology transfer, and innovation in agriculture. His work has been widely published in the economics literature as well as leading scientific journals such as Science and Nature Biotechnology.
At CSU, Dr. Graff teaches courses on the global agricultural and food system, agricultural policy, high tech entrepreneurship, and technological change in agricultural production.
Gregory Graff Bio
Most recently, Dr. Graff has worked with the United States Patent and Trademark Office, the World Intellectual Property Organization, and the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. He has also advised a number of startups and venture capital investors in the agricultural industry.
Dr. Graff received a bachelor’s degree in Biological Sciences from Cornell University in 1992, a master’s from Ohio State University in 1995, and a Ph.D. in Agricultural and Resource Economics from the University of California Berkeley in 2002.
Greg Perry
Greg Perry, professor in agricultural and resource economics, received a PhD in agricultural economics from Texas A&M University, with focuses in farm management, agricultural finance and agricultural policy. He has taught classes in agricultural finance, mathematical optimization, farm appraisal, farm management, entrepreneurship and human resource management.
He served for nearly a decade as a department head at Oregon State University and came to Colorado State University in 2011, where he served at department head.
Greg Perry Bio
Dr. Perry has two decades of experience as a real estate investor, developer, and has built or remodeled several houses. He and his wife co-owned a motorsports store in Idaho for 3 ½ years, taking a failing business and turning it around before selling it in 2021. They currently own a small cattle ranch in Wyoming and continue to look for interesting business opportunities. He has been married to his wife Patricia for 44 years and they are parents to 6 children and grandparents to 24. Dr. Perry is a native of Oregon and has been a faculty member at a land grant university since 1986.