About Us

The average dad spends about 6 hours a week with his kids. That’s not perfect, but today’s dads are doing better than the previous generation. PlaygroundDad.com is for the dads who dare to make the most of these 6 sacred hours–no Blackberrys; no conference calls–just quality time. Playground Dad connects this new generation of fathers with the events and products that help them spend better time with their newborn to grade school aged kids.

Founder

Mike Johnson – (Follow Mike @playgrounddad | Linkedin Profile)
Mike Johnson is the founder of Playground Dad, a brand dedicated to dads spending better time with their kids. A veteran of the video game industry, Mike has been an expert of online marketing and social media for over a decade. As a founding partner of Next Impulse Media, he specializes in building niche websites for the modern man.

A graduate of Amherst College and a Playground Dad himself, Mike and his wife, Nellie, are the parents of 4 daughters – Ella, Sadie, Lilian, and Cora. They live in Palo Alto, CA

Playground Dad Advisory Board

Christopher Erb – (Follow Chris @ChrisErb | Linkedin Profile)
Christopher  lives in Orlando, FL with his wife and twin sons. When not spending time with the little guys or rooting for his beloved Yankees, Christoper serves as Vice President of Brand Marketing for EA SPORTS. He is responsible for driving strategy and marketing for the EA SPORTS brand. Christopher oversees a cross-functional team that focuses on consumer marketing, licensing, and brand partnerships for EA SPORTS. In addition, his team is responsible for brand partnership activation across franchises within the EA SPORTS label, including Madden NFL, FIFA, Tiger Woods PGA, NHL, NBA, NCAA, EA SPORTS Active, MMA and Fight Night.

His leadership within the entertainment industry has revolutionized the way EA SPORTS markets to their consumers by elevating video game releases to be on par with highly anticipated film premieres. He pioneered applying the theatrical model of partnership and collaboration to video games which is now standard protocol within the industry. Christopher is responsible for transforming the annual release of the Madden NFL franchise into a summer event creating an unofficial start to the NFL season, and a designated placeholder on the NFL calendar. His work includes partnerships with top global iconic brands such as Coca-Cola, Nike, Microsoft, Sony, McDonald’s, Pepsi, Doritos, Mars and Coors Light.

Tom Edwards – (Follow Tom @theblackfin | Linkedin Profile)
Tom lives in Dallas, TX with his wife and 3 kids. When he’s not coaching his kids’ basketball and football teams, Tom spends his time as SVP, Digital Strategy & Emerging Technology for Red Urban (Omnicom). Tom brings over a decade of domestic & international experience defining interactive solutions for Fortune 1000 companies. The past five years were dedicated to enabling organizations to meet & exceed business goals via social media solutions. This included defining, implementing and measuring social media solutions across multiple social channels while integrating efforts with existing GTM strategies.

Tom is formerly the Chief Marketing Officer of the cloud based social solution provider INgage networks and prior to INgage was the VP, Worldwide Sales & Marketing of co-market leading (Forrester, Gartner) social solution provider Telligent Systems. During this time Tom covered multiple industry segments (Automotive, Retail, Consumer Package Goods, Health Care, Finance, etc..) Tom specializes in defining digital/social strategy and application of Web based and mobile solutions Previous clients include: Microsoft, P&G, Hasbro, Walt Disney, American Express, Dell, Electronic Arts, General Mills, & Intel. Tom also serves as a formal advisor & board member for multiple technology start-ups.