Celebrating 10 Years: Marketing Maven's Journey from 2016 to 2026
This year, Marketing Maven Consulting celebrates our TENTH anniversary in business full-time, with even more history before that. Founded in 2016, our firm offers year-round outsourced marketing for growing companies, otherwise known as brand management. We also offer one-time projects for website design, video production, graphic design, photography, and more.
Lots of people know about our team, but what they know may vary based on when they met us or what we helped them create. So, in honor of our 10-year anniversary, we thought we’d share a look back at the milestones that helped us evolve from day one to now.
2014
Side Hustle & Origin Story
When Rachel was still working full-time for a local nonprofit organization in Great Bend, Kansas, some of the other tenants in her building would refer to her as a “marketing maven” when sharing stories or advice. Rachel googled the term “maven” and immediately latched onto it as a point of pride:
According to the Webster Dictionary:
maven
noun
ma·ven ˈmā-vən
Definition of maven
: one who is experienced or knowledgeable: EXPERT
What started as a nickname to throw on an invoice for a side hustle ended up shaping the future of our company. That was the birth of Marketing Maven Consulting!
2016
Going Full Time & First Hires
By the fall of 2016, the side hustle had grown to an inflection point where it was time to dig in or scale back. On a hope and a prayer, Rachel loaned herself a few thousand dollars for a computer and software and launched the business full-time. Within a month, the first full-time employee joined the team, and services were expanding. Only a few months later, a second full-time employee was added.
2017
Our First Office Space
As the team expanded, Marketing Maven Consulting opened its first office in a coworking facility called The Fieldhouse in Great Bend, Kansas. The Great Bend Chamber of Commerce helped commemorate the milestone with a ribbon cutting in March 2017.
2017
Our First Student Intern
Fun Fact: Matt Phillips, who now serves as our Director of Web & Video, originally started as a part-time student intern while still in high school in 2017. We always joke that he is wise beyond his years, and you’d never know meeting him now that he started as the “baby” on the team.
2018
Expanded Video Capabilities
By 2018, social media was becoming increasingly video-focused, and the need for a studio space to record high-quality content with professional lighting and soundproofing was top of mind. We rented an extra room in our coworking space and built a custom studio with backdrops, lighting, and audio equipment. We also invested in professional DJI drone equipment to capture aerial photography and video footage.
2019
Evolving Our Branding
While our name has never changed, we made a big upgrade to our branding in 2019 with a new logo, color scheme, and website. Our original “feather logo” was retired, and a newer icon-style logo was rolled out.
2019
New Podcast & Larger Office Space
In early 2019, the team started the legwork to write, record, and release a new podcast called Brand Nation. The weekly podcast and YouTube channel were aimed at offering free resources and advice to entrepreneurs and growing companies. Around the same time, Marketing Maven relocated to a larger office space in downtown Great Bend with room for additional expansion. Once again, the Chamber of Commerce helped commemorate both milestones with a Ribbon Cutting event held in September 2019.
2020
The Pandemic
Need we say more?! The world was in a tough spot in 2020, and our client list and team changed a lot that year. Some people moved on, some clients closed their doors, and others really took off and started thriving because of opportunities created in a weird economy. We went through a lot of changes between 2020 and 2021, but ended up stronger on the other side. It toughened us up and gave us more clarity on how to stand out, so we wouldn’t change a thing!
2021
The First Marketing Maven Retreat
As the company grew and our team expanded, working remotely made team-building a challenge. So, we planned our first-ever team retreat to create core memories, dream together, and spend intentional time as a group. This is now a beloved tradition that continues to evolve from year to year, but we always make time to set goals and have fun together, with significant others included.
2022
Expanding Our Resources
As the Brand Nation podcast evolved and eventually retired, we still wanted to provide free resources and inspiration to our growing list of clients and friends in the business world. So instead of a weekly podcast, we shifted our energy into providing more robust resources and advice on a monthly basis. The website now includes a library of marketing and entrepreneurship resources, emailed out for FREE to anyone who subscribes, covering everything from website best practices and SEO to brand strategy and hosting signature events.
That same year, as more students heard about Marketing Maven and wanted a chance to learn and job shadow, we also developed a more organized shadowing program for students 16 or older, along with advice and resources for high school and college students interested in careers in marketing. Check out a spotlight post from 2024 job shadowing on our Facebook page.
2023
Growing Our Visibility & Capabilities
In the summer of 2023, a new office space became available in a great location with increased visibility, so the team jumped at the opportunity. The new office was furnished and ready to go in time for a Ribbon Cutting held in July 2023.
That same summer (2023), our team invested a lot of time and energy getting certified as a Wix Website Design team, even though we’d been professionally designing sites on the platform for nearly ten years. This included a trip to New York City to meet directly with the Wix management team and learn about the latest tools, including Wix Studio sites.
2023-2024
Expanding to Eight Mavens
In the spring of 2023, our team took a big leap from four full-time employees to five so that we could offer additional services and help more clients across the Midwest. By fall, the need to expand our graphic design services was impossible to ignore, so we created a new position for a second graphic designer, bringing our team to six full-time employees. This growth was significant because it also led us to create “departments” for the first time in our company’s history, organizing our team around several key functions: Web & Video, Marketing Strategy (Brand Management), and Graphic Design.
Our team continued to expand in 2024, adding a student intern to assist with writing, social media, and other special projects, followed by a second website designer later that year. These additions brought our team total to seven full-time employees and one part-time intern, or eight Mavens altogether.
2025
Investing in Our Brand & Culture
In 2025, our very talented website designers spent a lot of time and energy overhauling the Marketing Maven website to be a better poster child of our capabilities and a stronger portfolio for clients to browse. Instead of the “plumber with the leaky faucet,” we were finally presenting ourselves with the same level of professionalism we help our clients present themselves with.
That same year, we also put years of lessons about what works well, and what did NOT serve us well, into writing. From client red flags and hiring the best quality humans to operating at a high level as a remote team, we worked together to create a set of instructions describing in detail the culture we want and insist on. We jokingly nicknamed it our Culture Manifesto, which was officially approved and adopted by our team in 2025.
2026
Moving to Wichita
As our footprint continued to expand around the country and our team became more centralized around the Wichita metro area, we decided to take the plunge and move our office from Great Bend to Wichita in the spring of 2026. Our new office is located inside Groover Labs, a coworking space designed to foster relationships among tech-based companies, and we couldn’t be happier to be here!
2026
Nex-Gen Internship Program
For the first time, Marketing Maven partnered with the Nex-Generation Roundup for Youth program to offer a student internship specializing in video editing and content marketing. The program is operated by a nonprofit organization serving most of Kansas and helps facilitate student learning and connections with employers.
Awards & Recognition:
Our business continues to grow because of our unique approach to client relationships. We adamantly resist the “big agency” model with unnecessary overhead and corporate jargon. We are everyday, down-to-earth folks with a passion for quality design and detailed execution. We leverage our Midwest roots and Kansas work ethic to fully integrate into our clients’ organizations, get to know their teams, and really become part of their company. We want their employees to view us as colleagues and coworkers, not some big city firm that swoops in for a lot of meetings and then leaves.
Our company culture is built around exceptional communication, humility, and a genuine interest in helping our clients win year after year. It’s so rewarding to watch them crush their goals, grow their organizations, and impact their communities. Knowing that we play a part in that success and get to celebrate those victories alongside our clients is what gets us out of bed in the morning. This approach has earned the firm several awards and recognitions:
Business of the Year Award in 2018
NextGen Leader of the Year Award in 2019
Best of Web Design Award in 2022
Top Marketing Agency in Kansas Award in 2025
Feature Story by VoyageKC Magazine in 2026
Feature Story by Wichita Business Journal in 2026
While we’re proud of these accolades, they’re only a small blip in the many successes we reflect back on and remember with pride.
2026
Celebrating our 10th Anniversary
As we look back on the last ten years, we’re thrilled to celebrate our successes and continue the evolution of our small business to best serve our clients across the U.S. We invite our friends, clients, and followers to join us for a special Marketing Maven Mixer & Ribbon Cutting on Friday, November 13th at our new office in Wichita.
The come-and-go event will be held from 3:30-5:30 PM at Groover Labs, 334 N. Saint Francis Ave. in Wichita, Kansas. The ribbon cutting photo will be taken at approximately 4:00 PM following some brief remarks, with door prizes given away toward the end of the event around 5:15 PM. You do NOT have to be present to win, so stop by and drop your business card for a chance at some great, themed prize packages.
Learn more here or join the Facebook Event here.
