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Be Useful.
Be Kind.
Be Fearless.

Meet Our Team

We build brands through design, development, and strategic marketing. We believe honest, beautiful design can create a more pleasant world. We strive to provide kind, thoughtful value in everything we do. We embrace a culture of collaboration that values the relationship over the bottom line, where we partner with our clients and treat their business as our own.

Refusing to compromise on creating exceptional work, we thrive on solving problems and our passion shows through when we're challenged to think outside of the box and push the limits of creativity to design, build, and share delightful experiences across all mediums.

Meet Our Team
Lounge area in the Leverage office with a coffee table, chairs and a tv on the wall.

We strive to think strategically, act selflessly, and grow creatively.

Beyond simply designing, building, and implementing beautiful brand experiences, our team tackles each day with a broader goal — to provide value in everything we do. We're extremely proud of our insanely talented group that embodies our mission.

Headshot of Goon

Matt
Kreikemeier

Technology Director

My wife says I'm "infinitely curious". That's wife-code for, "Stop asking me so many questions." Luckily, Leverage provides me an outlet to embrace that curiosity and help companies across all industries reach their potential. I enjoy it so much, I hardly consider it work.

Outside of my career, my two boys, Mason and Oliver, keep me on my toes. They're my absolute best friends, though, so I love it. Mason (3) shares my love for learning. Oliver (1 12), shares his mom's zest for life.

My wife, Emily, and I always say that parenting our children is, easily, our greatest accomplishment. Outside of that, we enjoy spending time traveling and experiencing new things. To get away, we vacation at our family's quiet lake house. We consider ourselves incredibly blessed.

FUN FACT: I've been skydiving in Fiji over the Indian Ocean.
SPIRIT ANIMAL: Elephant
MOST-USED EMOJI: 😂

Headshot of Laura Benson

Laura
Benson

Creative Director

I have been working in the creative field for over 10 years. With experience executing web, print, packaging, and environmental design, I love mixing things up and am always up for a challenge. I graduated from the University of Missouri – Columbia with a BFA in graphic design and minors in journalism and art history. I have a passion for all things creative and truly find it rewarding to help companies succeed by creating beautiful visual solutions.

As a proud mom of twin boys (and two dogs), I love spending time with my family when I'm not creating beautiful things. I am a St. Louis sports fanatic at heart (Go Blues!!) and love to travel...when there is time.

Headshot of Abbey

Abbey
Schneider

Senior Creative

I joined Leverage in 2015 following a graphic design role in a corporate setting, and I initially had very minimal web design experience. In a sense, Leverage took a little bit of a gamble on me since the majority of our work is web-related, and for that I am very grateful. I had to quickly adapt to this change and have really grown to love it. The team at Leverage is encouraged to learn something new every day, which allows me to explore my ever-changing interests. They embrace my passion for fine art by allowing me to include illustrations whenever we get the chance – whether it's incorporated in a logo, poster, t-shirt, or holiday campaign.

In my free time, I love to explore the outdoors, and I'm fortunate that my husband, Joe, and my dood, Winslow (he's a Goldendoodle), share the same interests. Hiking, camping (or glamping), walks, and runs around our historic neighborhood are some of our favorite things. Unless it's one of those hot St. Louis summer days – then you can find me inside felting or watching my favorite cooking shows...and sometimes I get ambitious and do both at the same time.

FUN FACT: I once worked as a lunch lady at my former grade school.
INTERESTS: dogs, lakes, popcorn, beer, canoeing and traveling
SPIRIT ANIMAL: Hummingbird

Headshot of Shannon

Shannon
Brown

Account Management

In my career, I have always taken chances. I love a challenge and that shows in my career – from tackling account management, to raising children, to helping run a few multimillion dollar companies – I truly believe if you take a chance and believe in your abilities, you can learn and overcome anything. So when Leverage asked me to come onboard to help develop the EComm initiative at Purina, I was in! And it has been a great adventure for the past three years. My hope to is to continue to tackle challenges for our Leverage customers and make them more successful in their business ventures as a result.

My life centers around my four kids, and they are my biggest accomplishments. I also am a doggie mom to Sparky. My passions in life are food and music. If I am not at a live music event in St. Louis, chances are we are hitting the local St. Louis food scene and appreciating all the great restaurants in our town!

FUN FACT: I am headed to Iceland this summer with two of my kiddos.
SPIRIT ANIMAL: The Blackbird
SEARCHING FOR: The best Bloody Mary. Will take recommendations!

Headshot of Winslow

Winslow
The Dood

Office Pup

Going to work with mom = my favorite days.

My favorite things:

  • bananas
  • peanut butter
  • bananas with peanut butter
  • playing hide and go seek
  • playing fetch
  • chasing bunnies
  • watching squirrels
  • long walks
  • sprinting when we're supposed to be walking
  • hiking trips with my parents
  • desk surfing
  • tearing up important papers

FUN FACT: I once found the Easter bunny on Easter morning.
SPIRIT ANIMAL: Squirrel
FAVORITE EMOJI: 👅

What our clients say...

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Handwriting Animation Tutorial

Demo: codepen.io/drewhagni/pen/wvQXKKW Prerequisites: GSAP (basic knowledge) Adobe Illustrator (intermediate knowledge) Required tools: Club Greensock Adobe Illustrator (or similar) Caveats: Text is not readable by bots as it is converted to SVG shapes Illustrator is the only program I’ve successfully done...

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