BRATTLEBORO — Packing in as much as I could during 2013 (my final year at the Brattleboro Area Chamber of Commerce), I attended my first Vermont Travel Industry Conference - an upbeat, buzzy affair for any- and everyone concerned with travel and tourism.
There, I ran into Luke Stafford, who'd opened an Internet marketing agency in Brattleboro a few years before. Having heard that his company, Mondo Mediaworks, had won an annually given conference award, I congratulated my homeboy and went on to another session.
A few days later, I got hold of a press release about Mondo's good fortune. I found myself disarmed by the headline: “Mondo Mediaworks Takes Home Honorable Mention in Governor's SMART Biz Awards,” and especially its immediate subhead: “Vermont social media marketing agency misses top spot, doesn't get to meet Governor Shumlin.”
This rather tongue-in-cheek tone held from there on, ensuring Luke Stafford a top spot on my list of communicators to watch.
How delightful, then, to catch up with him in his top-floor Main Street office. And how delightful to get to know better someone in the new generation of marketing and communications professionals - someone who reminds me of me.
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Jerry Goldberg: Your website (mondomediaworks.com) presents your company superbly - as it should, because you're in the business of developing creative and effective website content. Wherefore the name Mondo Mediaworks?
Luke Stafford: I was born into a big Italian-American family, and I wanted to honor them and my Italian heritage somehow. Because the technology that drives what we do opens up worlds of possibility - the web, the cloud - and as mondo is Italian for “world,” it seemed a natural.
J.G.: Works for me. So where was home to this big Italian family?
L.S.: Well, the Italian is on my mom's side, from Massachusetts. But I was born and raised in Saugerties, N.Y. - a town of just shy of 20,000 along the Hudson River about 100 miles north of New York City and maybe 40 miles south of Albany.
J.G.: So from Saugerties to Brattleboro. Not too far for an old crow to fly, but it sounds like there's a story there.
L.S.: When I was a kid, I loved to write, and I guess I was considered pretty good at it. Starting in ninth grade, I worked at the high-school paper. Once I'd published my first story - it was on the school band - I knew I'd been bitten by the bug.
The paper was printed by the local weekly and the editor there saw something in my work. He invited me to intern, I responded “yes” in a New York minute, and I loved every minute of it from then on!
I landed a paying job at the Daily Freeman in neighboring Kingston - which is to Saugerties as Keene is to Brattleboro - where I covered lots of school board and other community meetings. I did that for less than a year when high school graduation came and a few months later my farewell to Saugerties.
J.G.: So “Goodbye, New York.” But why “Hello, Vermont?”
L.S.: Growing up, one of my favorite things was snowboarding. We came up to Vermont for a snowboarding trip, and I fell in love with the state - the Green Mountains, the whole feeling of the place - and decided that when the time came to go off to college, it'd be to Vermont.
As I'd made up my mind that I was going to be a reporter I looked first at the University of Vermont, but at the time they weren't offering a journalism curriculum. I checked St. Michael's College and they were - and a good one, too.
Before long, I hooked up with the student newspaper, eventually becoming arts and entertainment editor. In 2003, my senior year, the paper developed an online magazine, but I remained devoted to my first love - print journalism.
Even in 2003 as paper papers began to falter and online resources were gaining ground, print was still what most students were reading. Little did we know what was coming. Or maybe we did and just didn't want to believe it.
J.G.: So there you were, in Colchester, Vermont, and you wanted a newspaper job.
L.S.: Well, by then it wasn't just “me.” In the first week of my freshman year, I met the woman I'd eventually marry, Suzanne Paugh. She'd majored in fine arts, so it was now “we” - an artist and a budding journalist - who'd have to carve that path.
In 2003, one city in the country seemed to be attracting people like us, and that was Portland, Oregon. Portland was a bastion of creativity - a perfect place for those looking to be part of a community that welcomed the arts and artists. We went fast.
J.G.: What did you do there?
L.S.: Tried to survive, like most everyone else. Getting a job - any job - wasn't easy. Suzanne scoured the galleries and schools for teaching gigs. I pounded the pavement for a reporting job.
We were ready. Portland wasn't. Eventually, Suzanne was hired as a barista and also as a server. I did residential construction.
Once we accepted that Portland wasn't working for us, we set out for Steamboat Springs, Colorado. We had a blast living the ski/snowboard-bum lifestyle for a year. By then, we'd realized that Vermont was going to be our permanent home.
J.G.: Vermont's a big small state. You could have gone anywhere in it, yet you chose Brattleboro.
L.S.: We'd heard about Brattleboro all through school and must have filed it away as a place that'd be a good fit for us.
First, there's Brattleboro's obvious commitment to the arts. Suzanne paints, works with fabric, does printmaking, and has even gotten into outdoor sculpture. So it was important to her and to me that we live in a community that celebrates and supports the arts.
Second, Brattleboro has an amazing reputation. It shows up on more top-10 or top-25 or “best arts towns” or “best small towns” lists than any community its size. So it's not only those of us who've chosen to live here who honor it.
And finally, southern Vermont's close enough to Boston and New York - the city and, yes, Saugerties. We have family in Connecticut, too, and Brattleboro would put us in the right place. So we gave it a whirl.
Eventually, I got a gig teaching snowboarding at Mount Snow Resort, and Suzanne got to know the arts community. When the ski season ended, I was promoted to the marketing department, where I was able to use - at last - some muscles that snowboarding didn't call for. Like writing. Like creating.
J.G.: The stuff of life!
L.S.: Then I broke my arm pretty bad and had to be home for quite a while. I got together with a friend of mine who knew the mechanics of online publishing, and we started an e-magazine called Sketchy Van. It was focused on traveling around the U.S. I wrote. I edited. I was the content guy. And by the way, Suzanne had connected with the Putney School's Summer Program.
By the time the arm healed, I knew that I had to move and keep myself closer to developing content. It was 2009. The digital revolution had been going on for some time, yet there weren't too many people around this area who knew how to help businesses and organizations with more-modern digital communication. Like how to use social media. How to build an effective website. How to develop content that expressed the right messages in the right way.
I guess I've always been confident in my own skills, in what I knew I could do well. Since the local newspapers weren't rolling out a red carpet for me, there was one thing to do - my own. So I started a business.
J.G.: Were there any difficulties in establishing yourself - in town, in Vermont?
L.S.: I'm a pretty positive guy. What some would call a difficulty, I'd call a challenge. So I can't think of anything that made setting up Mondo hard. Forming the LLC was easy. Finding suitable office space downtown was easy. There were no impediments to moving forward on either the municipal or state levels. I've felt nothing but support.
J.G.: So what about others joining you in this new venture? It's interesting that there are that many young people around these parts with the kinds of skills and talents required by an enterprise like Mondo. How did you find them?
L.S.: We're at 13 employees! My first two hires were locals. As we've grown, I'd say it's been by word of mouth - putting it out there. I'll meet job seekers for coffee, and if I find something there - the smarts, the drive - I'll keep their resumes on file.
Only twice have I published a want ad - or even written up an official job description. Finding good fits is... well, you know it when you see it.
Right now we have staff from Alabama, from Virginia, and from New York - a bunch from New York. They love the work we give them the opportunity to do. And they seem fine with Brattleboro and the Vermont lifestyle.
J.G.: They say that people tend to want to be with people like them. I mean professionally. They like to share war stories. Develop that camaraderie. In cities like New York or Boston that can happen very easily. Have you found enough people in Brattleboro who can be part of “the conversation”?
L.S.: Enough to satisfy on a foundational level. But, yes, it is one of the “living here” challenges. There aren't 12 bars to drop into any night and meet chums. You have to be proactive. Seek out places and events where potential friendships might be seeded.
There's the Farmers' Market, where you can meet good people. There are organizations like the Southern Vermont Young Professionals - sponsored by the BDCC - which is a great way to keep those conversations going. A lot of Mondo employees go to their meetings and events. And the Chamber has a schedule of breakfasts and evening mixers. But, yes, it does take initiative.
J.G.: It's been six, going on seven years. How's business?
L.S.: It's going really, really well. We grew 60 percent year over year from 2014 to 2015. We anticipate reaching our goal of 35 percent growth this year and are looking at 30 percent for next year.
Because we're growing faster than I expected at first, I've had to modify my goals - to think bigger and have bigger expectations, to ask, “What could this be? What haven't I thought of yet?”
I didn't dare to think this big when we started. Now that I see what's happening, it's pretty exciting.
J.G.: I saw on your website that in mid-2015, just over five years after opening your doors, Mondo hit $1 million in gross revenue. Quite a milestone! How did it happen? How will it continue?
L.S.: First, I have regular meetings with the team - one at a time. I ask them: “Where do you want to be in three years?” And “Where do you think Mondo could be in three years?”
Even having achieved that $1 million revenue marker, Mondo's still small enough to grow in ways each one of us can influence. For it to be sustainable for all, we must all be happy and in sync with how it's growing and developing.
These meetings are conversational - not paper-driven. When you work in the digital world like we do, you have to be flexible - able to pivot if you need to. So Mondo might as well grow in a way that we as people can grow.
J.G.: Have you done something that as you look at it now you'd have done differently?
L.S.: I didn't go to business school, so I've had to figure a lot of this business stuff out for myself. I guess because I never had completely solid, etched-in-stone plans that I had to realize I didn't set myself up for failure. At the outset, had I set more aggressive goals for Mondo, maybe we'd be twice the size today.
My strategy then and today is to seek opportunities and jump on them. I guess I'm basically optimistic. I don't dwell on difficulty. I put my effort into what I can control, what I can do to make all this better.
J.G.: So what are some of the challenges you face? What can you make better?
L.S.: I have two main goals: one, to pay good salaries and two, to provide good benefits. Both are essential to retention and, frankly, the right thing to do.
At this point, it's not viable for Mondo to have a fully-funded health-care plan, and finding an importable solution to providing employee health care has been frustrating.
It's a national problem, of course, and Vermont, like other states with a lot of small- and medium-sized businesses, has its challenges. But I remain confident that the state will come up with workable solutions. There does seem to be a strong will up in Montpelier to do just that.
J.G.: As a creative person - a word guy, a graphics guy, a message guy - how do you reconcile the work of running your business with your creative side? How do you satisfy your creative inclination when you have to worry about such things as payroll and employee benefits?
L.S.: I remind myself often that starting and building a business does require creativity.
Most of my days are spent writing proposals, giving presentations, researching health-care providers, and the like. And yes, it's true that I don't always get to work on the fun stuff - like writing copy, or designing a logo, or actually shooting and editing a video.
But I can write a creative proposal. I find even writing a contract can be approached creatively and be satisfying. Frankly, seeing something I'm building succeed and sustain is just as rewarding as seeing something I wrote show up on thousands of sites or a video I made getting thousands of views.
So it's not less satisfying, it's just different. And I wouldn't have it any other way.
J.G.: Suppose someone asks you about the wisdom, the viability, of setting up a business here. They might already have a business somewhere and are thinking about moving it to the Brattleboro area, or they have a great idea for a business and are shopping sites. What would you tell them?
L.S.: There's no better place. The quality of life. The arts. The proximity to outdoor sporting. The access to cities for when you seek that.
I'd also tell them to read a lot. Teach yourself. There are so many business books out there. Even after almost seven years, I never feel that I've learned everything.
I'd tell them to find a good mentor or mentors and to be humble enough to listen to what they have to say and accept their help. I'd tell them to hire people who are smarter than they are and who have complementary skill sets. To never feel like you have to be the alpha dog - to be the best at everything. To never put yourself in competition with any of them, but rather to do all you can to bring out the best in them.
Remember - you're creating something bigger than yourself. It's called a team.
And also to go to mixers and events. If one of our Vermont politicos is coming to town, make sure you're there. You never know who you're going to meet. And you won't meet them if you're hanging around your office. You have to put yourself out there - go to where they'll be.
The rest will follow. You may not realize any immediate results, but sometime in the future....
J.G.: Each one of your clients has a story. Mondo Mediaworks does, too, right? What's the story you'd like to tell?
L.S.: It's important to me that the community understands that our digital marketing agency is not in business just to develop creative website content for our clients. A major component of our mission is to help with the economic development of our community. And I mean more than just giving back. I mean making an investment in the community.
An investment that will help keep young people here because there are opportunities for them. An investment that will attract people from elsewhere to come here because there are opportunities for them.
J.G.: That's quite a challenge, and I applaud you for taking it on.
L.S.: I'm not alone in this. If Michael Knapp at Green River, Michael Alexander at Recycle Away, and I get together to get the word out that techies and technology companies are alive and well in Brattleboro and in southern Vermont, there's no reason why the three of us couldn't build back the 150 well-paying jobs we're losing with the loss of Vermont Yankee.
If we're smart, we can do this. We can keep the community growing by growing our businesses. And by encouraging others like us to come here to do the same.
J.G.: Step by step. Enterprise by enterprise.
L.S.: Exactly. We want the community to understand that we entrepreneurs are here. To stay. To build our businesses, of course. But also to build something more, something special - a vital and vibrant community for us to work in, play in, and build our lives in.
Suzanne's now teaching art at the NewBrook Elementary School and in Saxtons River. We have two girls. This is important to us.