Introducing Josie Menley, our account manager who hails from St. Louis. Organized down to the last sticky note, Josie is the proactive problem-solver you can rely on as a stabilizing force when the campaign starts to shake. 

Before taking the reins, her professional journey began as an account service intern at Paradowski Creative, where she learned the ropes of client relationships. She sharpened her storytelling skills as a copywriter for Matchbook Marketing Agency and brought her creative vision to Letters of Love Mizzou as a graphic design chair. As VP of Programming and Events for Mizzou’s PRSSA chapter, she proved she can maneuver logistics with ease.

When she’s not busy prowling the MOJO Ad drive, Josie gives back through the Food Bank for Central and Northeast Missouri, using her organizational superpowers for the good of her community. 

But Josie’s true passion project has claws. She’s currently writing and illustrating a children’s book starring her outrageous orange cat, Willie, whose personality is big enough for its own storyline. What began as an inside joke has evolved into a furrocious dream and Josie can’t wait to see Willie’s wit hit the page. 

Evan Johnson is our Art Director from Shawnee, Kansas. A bonafide artist through and through, you can literally see Evan’s impact on Team Vertex, because he’s the visual mind behind it all. 

Outside of being from Kansas, Evan is a pretty cool guy! He’s spent the past several years making waves around the industry as an up-and-coming graphic designer, photographer and art director with visionary talent. After winning Gold at the KC AAF awards in Spring 2025, Evan took his talents to Signal Theory in KC, where he was an art director intern. Evan has also worked at Superheroes and Fuzzco as an art direction intern and graphic designer intern, respectively. In 2024, he designed and produced a book for Kansas City fashion designer Cory Infinite, being featured on Fox 4 for the project. 

Outside of his art direction endeavors, he’s also worked as a photographer for Mizzou Athletics, because his resume wasn’t already impressive enough. Evan is also a member of the Mizzou Radio Audio Technology Club, and volunteers at the True/False film fest. If he didn’t seem cool already, he also builds his own custom guitar pedals and makes music, too.

Meet Lauren Rowbottom, our PR Account Manager and proud product of Eureka, Missouri. Reliable, expressive and driven, Lauren brings big energy that extends through every execution. 

Her career runway includes launching campus initiatives for DoorDash, repping brands like Hollister, Owala and Remilia Hair, managing social media for Mizzou CHAARG and uplifting Healium, right here in Columbia, through her marketing communications internship. Countless side hustles coincide with pro bono work for Mission-Driven Tech and NIL campaigns through Mizzou PRSSA and volunteering with Cedar Creek Therapeutic Riding Center, because just one meaningful commitment a week won’t cut it.

Lauren’s endless energy extends well beyond campus. In a single two-week stretch, she studied abroad across Europe, chasing experience, inspiration and chimney cakes in equal measure. She returned home with a newfound obsession: postcards. Her bedroom walls now serve as a scrapbook of her travels across Europe, Latin America and the United States, proof of her ability to make every space (and campaign) feel personal. 

Reagan Manis is our talented, charming and affable copywriter who also happens to be writing his own bio. Hailing from Liberty, Missouri, Reagan is Team Vertex’s word guy. Along with Mia, he’s responsible for dotting the i’s, crossing t’s and making it all sound good. 

Reagan has worked in multiple different creative roles. He first served as a photographer for Mizzou Visual Productions, where his job was all about making Mizzou look good. He later joined Garmin Creative House as a copywriter intern, to work with the creative campaign team on {REDACTED}, {REDACTED}, and {REDACTED}. He’ll be returning to Garmin as a Copywriter upon graduation, and he won’t stop talking about how excited he is. 

Outside of his creative work, Reagan can be found running or hiking with his fianceé, Marianna, or his brother, Luke. With those two, he also volunteers at Camp Barnabas, a summer camp for individuals with special needs. He loves reading classical literature, and his favorite book is the Ballad of the White Horse, or basically anything else G.K. Chesterton wrote. He’s also incapable of being casually interested in anything, so if you get him talking, do it at your own risk. 

This is Mia Vogel, the yin of Vertex’s copywriting duo. Hailing from Kansas City — the Kansas side, in case you’re curious — she’s creative, savvy and chronically Type B (case in point: she’s writing this at the last minute). Mia has a knack for turning a blank doc into something worth poring over.

She spent the better part of the year interning at FleishmanHillard in Brussels, Belgium, where she supported the studio team in creatively tackling policy communications for NGOs and changemakers across the EU. After making her grand return to the States, she did a 180 to Six One, a boutique LA-based PR firm, where she worked to uplift small and emerging brands. All that to say, student-run agencies like Matchbook Marketing and MOJO Ad are where she’s had the chance to hone her skills at the intersection of leadership, strategy and creativity.

But don’t go thinking she’s all work and no play. Her passport has become a battered book, and she’s currently trying her hand at French. She’s always on the hunt for a new restaurant, an undiscovered thrift spot or an arthouse film by a director she’s never heard of. You can catch her in a theater near you this spring at the True/False Film Festival, daydreaming about her next excursion or posted up at a local coffee shop as a lifelong devotee.

Meet Kolden Lam, Vertex’s video producer extraordinaire. A St. Louis native with an eye for the perfect frame, Kolden has a knack for turning everyday moments into visuals worthy of a double take. Whether he’s behind the camera at a performance or creating content for social media, he brings a thoughtful eye and aptitude for visual storytelling to everything he captures.

His path behind the camera began with Mizzou Visual Productions and Carolina Crown, where he photographed performers in motion and learned to capture the art of live performance. He later took on the role of social media manager for La Voûte, expanding his creative toolkit beyond the camera and into the world of digital storytelling. As part of Marching Mizzou’s media team, he’s found the perfect intersection of two of his greatest loves: performance and production.

The performing arts have shaped Kolden’s life since freshman year of high school, when marching band and color guard first became a major part of his world. In fact, they’re what sparked his interest in media in the first place. For Kolden, every performance is a new story to capture and a reminder that teamwork and a little creative magic can go hand in hand.

Grace Ensor is Vertex’s Digital Strategist from St. Louis. Dependable, curious, and driven, Grace’s job is to use analytics and insights to formulate and implement a winning social strategy for Team Vertex. 

Before MOJO Ad, Grace spent the past several years building her resume on and off campus. She’s done two internships at Keeley Companies, a national construction company headquartered in St. Louis. Over her time there, she coordinated corporate events and also organized digital marketing. In Columbia, she sharpened her digital strategy skills as insights team researcher at Matchbook Marketing at Mizzou, and she’s also done pro bono NIL work for Mizzou Athletics through PRSSA. 

Grace loves to run, and after running cross-country in high school, she’s completed two half marathons, with a full on her bucket list. She spends her time away from school traveling, and her favorite places she’s visited have been Split, Croatia and Kotor, Montenegro! 

Ellie Hanrahan is Vertex’s Strategist from St Louis. Enthusiastic, curious and driven, Ellie crunches the numbers and gets down to the cold-hard facts that are the cornerstone of our campaign. She’s our numbers girl, and we mean that in the coolest way possible. 

Pre-MOJO Ad, Ellie was tearing it up in New York as a marketing intern at Cerity Partners. She loved the experience living in the Big Apple and would love to go back when she’s graduated. Ellie has also been an account management intern at The TEAM, because what can’t she do?

In Columbia, Ellie is the social media coordinator for the Career Center for Mizzou. She has also served as the public relations specialist at Matchbook Marketing Agency, Mizzou’s student-run marketing house. She’s also a member of Mizzou PRSSA and Griffiths Leadership Society on campus. 

When she’s not kicking butt in Qualtrics, you can almost certainly find her book-mogging Reagan and Josie (that’s no joke, she reads over 100 a year). She spent her summers as a kid at sleepaway camp in New Hampshire and credits this experience with developing her interpersonal and problem solving skills. 

About as well-rounded of a team member as you could ask for, Sophie Gasior is Team Vertex’s veritable Swiss Army Knife and Strategist. In her role, Sophie reads between the lines and finds the human insights behind every interview and focus group. It takes work to see the “intangibles” that make a campaign run, but Sophie makes it look easy.

Before stepping on at MOJO Ad, Sophie was the President of Sigma Kappa, Copywriter and PR Department Head for Matchbook Marketing, while also being a member of iCOM, the Honors College, and the Griffiths Leadership Society. Her time in leadership has equipped her to understand how people tick.

In time away from work and school, Sophie loves unwinding and relaxing by being outdoors. Her personal favorite activities are hiking and kayaking, and she loves using them as a way to step away from the hustle and bustle of her day-to-day life. Her favorite places she’s kayaked were in a clear bottom kayak at Green Lakes State Park in New York and Cypress Springs in Florida. 

Get to know Emma Short, our Media Planner hailing from Lewisville, Texas. A human calendar of sorts, she’s the type to have a plan, a backup plan and a third plan just in case. 

Emma has built her strategic toolkit across continents, from a global franchise communications internship at Alcon to a marketing PR role with the ADHD Advocate in London. Back on campus, she’s led as Department Head of Insights at Matchbook Marketing Agency and Copy Chief at the Maneater — proof she’s just as comfortable a wordsmith as she is an analyst. 

When she’s not volunteering with Lizzy’s Walk of Faith or the Central Missouri Humane Society, Emma is almost certainly hunkered down, needlepoint in hand. Her latest fixation has taken over her spare time, turning finished projects into fridge magnets and ornaments. Throw in watercolor, DIY decor and scrapbooking, if not in the MOJO Ad lab, you’ll probably find Emma wandering the aisles of Michaels.