Published on Show Me Mizzou Sept. 16, 2025
Story by Tony Rehagen, BA, BJ ’01
When Kim Utlaut arrived at Mizzou as a student, she was a small-town farm girl moving to the big-city school. But she found that she could quickly make the campus feel small. “You could do as much or as little as you wanted,” she says. “You just had to find what worked for you and take advantage of the opportunity.”
Utlaut, BS ’89, made the most of her time at Mizzou and used her education as a launching pad for a marketing career that spanned four decades at some of the globe’s most iconic brands, including Anheuser Busch, Sprint, Coca-Cola and Build-A-Bear Workshop. Now, as Mizzou Alumni Association president, Utlaut is looking to bolster the organization. “The MAA’s brand is about connection and engagement,” she says. “We want to be the global leader in alumni engagement.”
The most important Mizzou engagement of Utlaut’s life might have been her parents’ — the two fell in love as students in the early 1960s. They shared a passion for the school, which their daughter inherited. They would take her to football games, and at Homecoming, she’d sit on the curb across from the Heidelberg and watch Marching Mizzou parade down the street. “I wanted to be part of that,” she says. “I never thought of going anywhere else.”
After initial aspirations to be a sports journalist, Utlaut returned to her farming roots and majored in agricultural economics. She quickly got involved with extracurriculars, such as serving on the executive committee of her Pi Beta Phi sorority, the Homecoming Steering Committee, Greek Week Steering Committee, the Student Athletic Board and the Alumni Association Student Board.
As president of the MAA, Utlaut wants to take big swings to influence her fellow 370,000-plus Tiger alums, ignite their passion and deliver meaningful Mizzou moments. She cites 2024, when the MAA rented out the major-league baseball stadium in Arlington, Texas, to host 11,000 Mizzou alumni and fans for a Cotton Bowl tailgate blowout. “I want to be big, bold and visible to our alums,” she says. “And I want to think big and bold in how we connect and engage with them.” The goal, she says, is to make the large, far-flung group of Tigers “feel more like family.” In other words, she wants to make the world of Mizzou alums seem a little smaller.
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