Soda Pop Public Relations

How did you get started in PR? why did you start your own business?

It was never part of the plan to start my own PR shop. I had spent a number of years working my way up the industry ladder. The climb left me burnt out. During the thick of the burn out, I was presented an opportunity to start my own company. Normally, starting a company is not the natural next step when you’re fried, but it made perfect sense to me. I knew that opportunities like this don’t come around often and it was time to jump. Looking back, I’m glad I didn’t have some master plan. I took a leap of faith, put my head down and made it happen.

What are your primary responsibilities?

My primary responsibilities are to make sure we are doing our best work on behalf of our clients and investing time and training into my team. On the client side, my role has transitioned from the day to day contact to strategic lead. A majority of my time is spent working with the team to review plans, helping to solve problems/challenges, brainstorming creative campaigns as well as putting out most fires that pop up. On the team side, it’s very important to foster a healthy, open and fun work environment. I make it a priority to plan fun off-sites for bonding and creative inspiration as well as finding creative talks, conferences and festivals for us to attend as a team.

What is the mood like in the office? What are you working on right now?

What I love most about the vibe in our office is even though we are a group of hardworking, organized overachievers, we always find ways to lighten the mood and support one another. The nature of our work can be stressful since it’s mostly a hustle. Deadlines and changing plans are part of the gig so a well-timed inside joke, donut/ice cream/cookie/wine break or mini-therapy session go along way.