After two years satisfying caffeine addicts through her mobile café business, Traci St Lawrence has returned to PR, signing on as account manager with Max Australia.

Having missed the creative aspect, and intellectual stimulation of public relations, St Lawrence decided to sell her small business and return to the industry in which she has spent most of her professional life.
St Lawrence opted for a career change two years ago after leaving her demanding role as APAC PR Manager with Baltimore Technologies - now SecureNet. In what appeared to be a world far removed from PR, St Lawrence decided to build her own mobile café.

"It was an opportunity to back myself and build a business using all the PR skills I had developed over the years," St Lawrence said.

After reaching a point in her career where things were changing professionally, St Lawrence said she wanted to find out what she could do on her own. "I saw an opportunity to do something else in a time in my career where the door was left open for me to do so."

After spending three years with Baltimore, and enduring the corporate changes that occurred during its merger with SecureNet, the catalyst for her career change had arrived.

"The company had gone through a huge culture shift and it had lost the family feel that it had when I first joined," St Lawrence said.

Building her own mobile cafe from scratch, St Lawrence used the knowledge and experience she had gained from working eight years in PR, including researching the market, building her own website, taking part in large public events, and developing a franchise market.

"Succeeding in PR is about excellent communication and organization, and the exact same thing applies for running your own small business."

But St Lawrence did not intend making cappucinos forever and, having successfully built her own business, she sold it when the work became a process of "going to the same places at the same time everyday to make the same coffees for the same people".

After selling, St Lawrence joined the team at Max Australia.

"By the time my interview with Fiona Martin was half-over, I knew I had found somewhere that would be challenging, rewarding, and most importantly, somewhere where I would feel right at home," St Lawrence said.

Account Director at Max, Fiona Martin, said that St Lawrence would prove a critical member of the Max team. "We needed someone who had a great track record and relevant experience. Combine that with the experience of running her own business, and working in-house, and our clients are already happy with her performance," Martin said.

Accounts St Lawrence is working on at Max include Fuji Xerox Printers, MRO Software, and Veritas Software.
Prior to joining Max, St Lawrence spent eight years in PR, including three years at Readers Digest, three years at Recognition PR and two years at Baltimore Technologies.

"Just as I used my PR skills to start and grow my own business, I now feel that I can bring the lessons I have learned from running my own business back into PR."