The fifth Small Talk was hosted by Elevate Studios on Tuesday, September 25. The firm was founded in 2003 by Lawrence Bak with his last unemployment check. Since that time, it has expanded to five employees with a growing clientele of well-known brands such as the Sundance Channel, Redken and Time Warner.

As a fairly young business, much of the presentation focused on their developing company identity and offerings. What began as a full-service communications firm has since been refined to exclusively interactive marketing solutions. Most employees of Elevate have come from big agency environments, which has led to the characterization of being a “start-up with the mindset of big agencies.” Largely in reaction to these experiences, the company’s motto is “bigger is not better—better is better.”