Carissa Villacorta Biography

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Leadership

Board of Governors | National Chairman’s Councils | National Staff

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Carissa Villacorta

Executive Director

Carissa Villacorta began her career in the Internal Communications Department of Globe Telecom, where she created and implemented an award-winning and trailblazing campaign employee-fundraising campaign for Habitat for Humanity.

When she was 22, she moved to New York City to study fashion design and styling, until she found out she could not sew or draw.

She walked in the Philippine Consulate General on Fifth Avenue in New York when then Consul General Linglingay Lacanlale engaged her to help form a network of young Filipino American professionals and set up the Read Philippines book collection in New York/New Jersey public libraries. In 2004, the network of young professionals called CORE (Collaborative Opportunities for Raising Empowerment), lit the Empire State Building in the colors of the Philippine flag, becoming the first Asian country to do so.

In 2008, she founded and ran her own PR firm, CVPR, based out of New York City since 2007. She worked as the PR Consultant of high-profile business executives, philanthropists and multi-national corporations, organizing events in the Hamptons, The Harvard Club, Lincoln Center Yankee Stadium. The events that Carissa organized publicized  has attracted attendance and coverage from the New York Times, NY1, Bloomberg, etc.

She is the author of Surreality, a collection of essays about life in NY from the perspective of a young Filipina publicist. She became the only Filipino author to have had a book launch and signing at a Borders book store in 2006.

In 2013, she returned to Manila and joined Ogilvy PR to represent the Cebu Chamber of Commerce and Industry, helping to boost the popularity of Cebuano entrepreneurs, from the founders of startups like Loudbasstard and The Chocolate Chamber to industry leaders like Kenneth Cobonpue. After leaving Ogilvy to return to her personal practice, she also helped jumpstart the popularity of Movenpick Hotel Mactan Island Cebu.

Through compelling stories, valuable connections, and a personal approach, Carissa has built bridges to connect various businesses with their target audiences, and contributed to their success — such as original campaigns like the Eat and Greet Tour of Cebu in 2015, creative events like CreatePH Pop-Up  in 2016, and community philanthropy through product design of the Global Filipino Watch by Philip Stein in 2017.

In 2018, Carissa created ReachUs, LLC and staged #PHTimeIsNow at the Harvard Club in NYC, once again bringing people together in a time and space of collaboration, motivation and inspiration through digital marketing, event planning and PR.

She is elated and hopeful to continue doing purposeful work for the Filipino American and Asian American community as she joins the National Federation of Filipino American Associations as Executive Director.[/vc_column_text][vc_empty_space 0=””][/vc_column][/vc_row]