Biography of Ginger Nichols, CAE

Ginger Nichols, CAE, is founder and principal of GinCommGroup. She began her career in communications and marketing, working in health care and as the Public Affairs Officer for the Canadian Consulate General in Dallas. She segued into association management in 1982, when she moved from her native Texas to Washington, DC. Ginger spent ten successful years directing membership, marketing and planning activities for two national associations, where she won national awards for communications and created record-setting membership recruitment programs.

After moving from Washington, DC, to San Francisco in 1991, Ginger founded GinCommGroup to continue her work with the association community. Her clients include a diverse cross section of members — professional, trade, philanthropic — and vary from international to local associations, across the country.

In 2001, she relocated her business to her hometown of Dallas, TX, providing a more central location for her association clients.

Ginger is a frequent speaker and instructor for the American Society of Association Executives and other allied societies. For the past four years, she served as Dean of the Membership Marketing Program of ASAE’s School of Association Management, where she taught the membership recruitment component. An active ASAE member since 1982, Ginger is past chair of the Membership Section Council and a former ASAE Director.

In addition to her six years on the Membership Section Council, she has served on numerous ASAE committees and task forces, mostly recently as chair of ASAE’s Strategic Leadership Forum. For the past three years, she has served on the Board of Directors of the ASAE Foundation, and she is currently serving as Chair-Elect.

In 1995, ASAE recognized Ginger’s contributions to the profession by naming her a Fellow, an honor held by fewer than 200 association executives and suppliers nationwide. Ginger served on the Board of Directors of the Northern California Society of Association Executives. She is also a member of the National Speakers Association.

Ginger earned her Certified Association Executive designation in 1990 and is re-certified through 2003. A Dallas, Texas native, she holds an undergraduate degree from the University of Houston and a master’s degree from George Mason University in Virginia.