Brian Birtwistle

Brian Birtwistle is Senior Vice President of Marketing and Design at Ripple. For the last 25 years, he has held executive positions at early-stage, rapid-growth technology companies. Brian recently led product development at Indigo Ag, where he served as Chief Product Officer. Prior to that, he was Chief Operating Officer at Tilt, a social payments startup acquired by Airbnb.

Brian also led marketing at gaming giant Zynga in the years leading up to its IPO. Before that, he was CEO of WineAccess, pioneering the flash-sale model for high-value, small-production wines. He began his career in technology as an early employee and rising executive at Amazon, ultimately serving as General Manager for two of its retail businesses. Brian holds a bachelor’s degree from Princeton University and an MBA from Harvard Business School.

Brian was introduced to the problem of food insecurity 20 years ago while living in Seattle. He felt outraged that so many families and children face this struggle in communities all over the United States, so he joined Food Lifeline as their youngest board member. Today in the Bay Area, the magnitude of this problem – especially after the pandemic – requires the attention, resources and time of everyone in our community who can help. He joined the Second Harvest Board in 2017 because he believes Second Harvest can meet the challenge.