Senior Capstone - Visiting Marathon Headquarters!

This semester I finally get to start working on my senior capstone project! I’ve been looking forward to it since I’ve heard what it was. This week, however, got me beyond excited. Since I’m a marketing student, I have the wonderful opportunity to work with Marathon Fuel for my capstone project. We will be working on regional marketing research and projects for our “client” or Marathon Fuel. 

Tuesday morning my capstone class met at the company’s headquarters in Findlay. It was awesome! The day was filled with tours, meetings and an amazing breakfast. Not only did it make me realize how lucky I am to work with such a big company, but also how fortunate I am to be attending a business college with such great opportunities. 

We started the morning by checking in with security and meeting members of the marketing team. We then were taken to the cafeteria for breakfast. Here, we were able to get anything we wanted that was offered! I ordered a custom breakfast sandwich, coffee and a side of fresh fruit. It was delicious. After breakfast, we sat in a presentation. This allowed us to know more about our client and who we were working with. It also gave us an opportunity to ask any questions we had about the company or project. After the presentation, we split off into two groups for tours. 

This was probably the highlight of the trip for me. We met with so many cool people! Our first stop was with a group that monitors and controls the pipelines for the company. I learned how petroleum, jet fuel and crude oil travel across states (it was a little mind-blowing) and how Marathon tracks all of this. Following this, we went through some of the facilities and made our way to the graphic design and photography department. Here, we were a part of a fun, interactive demonstration about what this department does every day. Everyone in my group was assigned a role to play in the recording studio. I was “the talent”. This meant I had to learn a script in about a minute, read off the teleprompter without stumbling and look at the camera! It was quite fun. 

We wrapped up our tour with a visit to the marketing building, which had three different floors with so many cool subdepartments and jobs. We were able to walk around and see the layout, what offices look like and what kind of projects people work on. Along the way, we spotted some Ohio Northern University Alumni hard at work! Overall, the whole experience was nothing short of amazing. I am now eager to start my project and am looking forward to my future career. I’ve known for awhile that I would enjoy marketing, but Tuesday truly showed me I made the right decision for my studies. It’s going to be great!

That’s all for now,

Abby