Humans & Brands

What if agency work felt like having beers with your friends instead of a boring meeting? Dana Hork started Beers With Friends because she was tired of the traditional agency model. As a former brand-side marketer, she knew what modern brand builders needed: speed, focus, great people, and a seat at the tables that matter. So she built an agency around 5-day creative sprints called "beer runs." Cl...

Getting laid off sucks. But it turns out that most people say it's the best thing that ever happened to them. Stefanie's story is proof. Stefanie Beach never planned to start a business. She fell into it after getting laid off and then trying to find a job that allowed her to be home more for her daughter. Nine years later, she's built something on her own terms and learned what it takes to keep g...

He's never been the quietest person in the room, and that's exactly why we wanted him here. Lou Paskalis has spent three decades at the intersection of marketing, media, and accountability. He's launched Small Business Saturday at American Express, pioneered brand safety models at Bank of America, and now runs his own consultancy advising two dozen clients on go-to-market strategy.  This week, hos...

Courage isn't the absence of fear. It's conquering it anyway. Carolina Cespedes Virguez is the SVP General Manager of GoGo squeeZ in the U.S., running a $650 million business with the mission of taking it to $1 billion. But getting here was a journey. It meant learning new languages, navigating unfamiliar cultures, and saying yes to things before she felt ready. All while dealing with imposter syn...

If you'd rather try and fail really hard than not try at all, then you have the soul of an entrepreneur. This week's story dives right into that. Lee Evans Lee is the founder & CEO of Mrs Momma Bear, a clothing brand built around the idea that women shouldn't have to choose between comfort and looking polished. Everything is made from athleisure fabrics but tailored in an elevated English styl...

This week's episode is a little different. Host Lauren Douglass sits down with Lacey Tucker, whose TikTok series documenting her marriage unraveling has captivated millions. What started as a relationship that seemed picture-perfect slowly turned into something much darker: a pattern of lies, manipulation, financial abuse, and moments that were not just confusing, but dangerous. Lacey shares how s...

You're not building a business, you're solving a problem.  Shiv Gupta is the Founder and CEO of U of Digital, and he's spent the last eight years learning that lesson the hard way. This week, host Lauren Douglass sits down with Shiv to talk about business fundamentals, staying focused when you want to do everything, and why the best companies lead with problems, not solutions.  They dig into what...

The best salespeople aren't selling at all, they're listening. Lucy Markowitz is the SVP and GM of US Marketplace at Vistar Media, and she's spent her career mastering the art of getting people on board. This week, host Lauren Douglass sits down with Lucy to talk about what separates a great seller from an average one, and it's not tactics or scripts. It's how you show up, how you listen, and how...

It takes so much ego to start a business, and then you have to let go of all of it to actually build one. Anda Gansca is the CEO of Knotch, and she's spent the last 10 years building a company while simultaneously breaking down every assumption she had about what it takes to succeed. This week, host Lauren Douglass sits down with Anda for a conversation that goes beyond the typical founder story a...

The best leaders aren't the ones with all the answers, they're the ones willing to ask more questions. Alena DeSalvo didn't set out to work in media; she kind of stumbled into it. Now, as SVP and Head of Marketing at Sightly, she's figuring out leadership, growth, and what it means to build something in real time. This week, host Lauren Douglass sits down with Alena to talk about what's driving he...

What do you learn about yourself when you're alone in the mountains for a month with no plan and no one to impress? John Starkweather is the VP of Advertising at AT&T, but this conversation isn't really about advertising. It's about what happens when you get quiet enough to actually hear yourself, and what changes when you stop being so rigid about everything. This week, host Lauren Douglass s...

Rachel Goldflam is building something from scratch, and she's doing it in a category that doesn't quite exist yet. As CMO of Sneex, a hybrid sneaker-heel brand, Rachel is figuring out how to normalize a product people have never seen before, get it on enough feet to reach a tipping point, and do it all with a scrappy team of four. This week, host Lauren Douglass sits down with Rachel to talk about...

Not all pivots are about moving up, some are about moving on. Dave Kersey is the Global Head of Media at SharkNinja, and his journey here includes a wrong phone number that changed everything, switching from architecture to media on a hunch, and learning the hard way when to walk away. This week, host Lauren Douglass sits down with Dave to talk about career pivots, unexpected turns, and why he did...

Sunni Hickman spent 20 years working with some of the biggest brands in the world: Dollywood, the Harlem Globetrotters, amongst others, before stepping into what she calls her "desert season."  A brand strategist and connector, she now has her own company, B. Sunni Hickman, where she helps organizations and audiences find their voice, own their story, and ignite growth. This week, host Lauren Doug...

This week on Humans & Brands, we're doing something a little different and flipping the script as Courtney Johnson interviews our host Lauren Douglass on Courtney's podcast, Slay the Gatekeeper. This one's all about cheat codes. Lauren shares the cheat codes that have shaped how she shows up, builds, and creates, from reframing fear into courage, to using intuition as a business tool. The wome...

Am I living or am I just existing? That's the question that hit Eleni McCready at a funeral three years ago, and it changed the course of her life.  This week, host Lauren Douglass sits down with Eleni McCready, Partner and Chief Marketing Officer at PWRHOUSE Collective, who recently left the corporate world after 20 years to leap into consulting. We talk about the funeral that changed her life, w...

What does it take to turn down a full-time offer at one of the biggest beauty brands right out of college to start your own company? This week, host Lauren Douglass sits down with Brittany Lo, founder and CEO of Beia Beauty and Beautini, a clean beauty brand creating lifestyle skincare that keeps you clean and confident throughout the day. Brittany gets honest about what it takes to build a beauty...

What does it mean to keep the human at the center of everything you do? Host Lauren Douglass sits down with Heather Bollinger, Chief Revenue Officer at Vurvey Labs, an AI company that's built on a simple but powerful idea: AI should be powered by people, not replace them. Heather's path is anything but linear: from anti–human trafficking work overseas in her 20s, to leading revenue at an AI compan...

From Gen Z to AI, Racine Levy breaks down what it really takes to stay human in modern marketing. This week, host Lauren Douglass sits down with Racine Levy, marketer, connector, and self-proclaimed “cringe enthusiast”, for a sharp, funny, and real conversation about what it means to be human at work. Racine shares how confidence, curiosity, and a strong network have shaped her career, why “cringe...

What happens when you refuse to let your past define your future? This week, host Lauren Douglass sits down with Troy Alexander, the founder and CEO of T363 Skin and a motivational speaker whose story is pretty extraordinary. Troy went from a two-year prison sentence to building a business and a life rooted in unwavering self-belief. In this conversation, Troy shares the four principles that guide...

From perfume labs to Glamsquad’s CMO chair, Simona Gaudio shares how detours, setbacks, and self-belief built her nonlinear career. This week on Humans & Brands, host Lauren Douglass sits down with Simona Gaudio, CMO of Glamsquad, for an honest conversation about leadership, career detours, and staying kind in a business that often rewards the opposite.   Simona shares how she went from workin...

This week we're flipping the script. Instead of hosting, Lauren joins Valerie Vespa and Matt Wurst on The Snarketing Podcast, and the conversation is too good not to share. We touch on some of Lauren's favorite hottakes: why B2B marketing is so bad right now, why most corporate brands are failing to break through the noise, and why the human touch is already more important than ever in an AI-cente...

This ones for the dreamers who are all about rejecting the traditional path. What happens when you build a company from a calling instead of a business plan? Maria Sipka, Co-Founder and EVP of Brand Strategy at Linqia, shares one of the most profound conversations about entrepreneurship you'll hear. From a 10-day silent Vipassana retreat that told her to leave everything behind, to spending two ye...

What does it really mean to be daring? This week we explore taking big swings and stepping into opportunities that feel scary but could change everything. Host Lauren Douglass sits down with Jennifer Peabody, President of Havas Edge, who knows exactly what this looks like. Jennifer made the bold decision to take a job three levels below her previous role and cut her salary by two-thirds, and it be...

Growing up with big dreams written on a whiteboard (own Manchester United, start a media company, buy a yacht), Michelle Turnbull Reeves, three-time founder and Founder & CEO of Zipline AI, meant writing her own rules from day one. From a small suburb in Brisbane to building multiple successful companies, Michelle's story is about the power of beautiful naivety and never waiting for permission...