Today we’d like to introduce you to Justin Samuels.
Justin, can you briefly walk us through your story – how you started and how you got to where you are today.
A little over a year ago, I was on a plane headed to yet another tech conference on the west coast of the United States. I found myself getting disgruntled on the 4.5-hour plane ride, and started to wonder why is the burden of travel placed mostly on those going from east to west, but not the other way around in the tech industry. While attending the conference, I began to notice how I was one of a few black software engineers at the conference, with only one being a black woman. This was a shock to me (kinda) because, the conference claimed to lead a huge diversity effort to impact underrepresented attendance at the conference, but it was apparent that they missed the mark with such.
When I returned to Atlanta, I immediately began to think of how I could recreate the typical conference experience, but for underrepresented groups, in particular, the black diaspora. Having been in the industry for a while, I immediately reached out to my fellow conference speakers, and other tech allies, and quickly received support to participate in my efforts. While planning, I quickly realized that it would be best to focus on one particular technology for year 1, rather than an entire conglomerate, so I decided to go with the industry’s most used Javascript library, React.JS. Another realization that came to me during planning was that this will be the south’s first international React conference, and by size we will be the largest for the eastern United States; both of which will help solve the original problem of having to fly western for major tech conferences, and having a strong underrepresented group presence for a tech conference.
We’re always bombarded by how great it is to pursue your passion, etc. – but we’ve spoken with enough people to know that it’s not always easy. Overall, would you say things have been easy for you?
For the most part, the road has been smooth sailing because our team is really great at the art of storytelling. By focusing on the story of why the conference began, we’ve been able to lure lucrative sponsorships from some very notable brands such as Etsy, and Amazon Amplify to name a few, while also attracting a high amount of attendees very early on. When we officially launched tickets on August 1st, 2019, we rapidly sold-out of the early bird tier tickets in under 20 hours, and sold through a quarter of the regular tickets as well within that time. For a tech conference, that’s unprecedented because most sales are within the last 60 days, whereas we are already half-way sold-out and have another 6 months to go.
The most difficult thing has just been tying down all the moving pieces of what’s to happen before, during, and after the conference. This includes the run of show schedule, hiring an M.C. and D.J. (still looking), and designs for banners and other merch to supply at the conference (still looking as well). Overall, the experience has been rewarding, and I wouldn’t change it for anything else.
So let’s switch gears a bit and go into the Render-Atlanta story. Tell us more about the business.
Render-Atlanta is a React Javascript conference focused on the intersection of culture, and tech to advance the abilities of underrepresented groups in tech. These underrepresented groups include women, minorities, LGBTQIA+, non-binary, immigrants, and the disabled. Our goal is that everyone who attends will leave a better engineer with the engineering knowledge, and culture perspectives gained during our 3-day conference. We’re different from other conferences because we focus on culture as a whole (not diversity), and the strength of our tech talks are world-class. We don’t use the “D” word (diversity), because of how to bastardize it has become in recent years by marketing teams at tech companies. Instead, we say “culture”, because we want engineers and their employers to experience the sight, sound, and feeling of having a wide diaspora of engineers in the workplace which could intrinsically affect the products, values, and mission statement of the company for the better.
Another unique thing to mention is that our conference is the first in tech to be all-inclusive pertaining to food, drinks, and networking. Each ticket sale includes daily breakfast, lunch, and dinner, happy hours, and a conference T-Shirt. We’re also having a job fair on-site, which will only be open to conference attendees. This translates into the attendee or company only having to pay for their transportation, and lodging to attend, thus less cost of overall attendance. For our speakers, it’s even better because we’ve covered all their costs including flights, hotels, and ground transportation while in Atlanta. Most other conferences can’t do this their first year, but we’ve been lucky with the sponsors we’ve captured early and have been able to afford such opportunities. We’re still actively looking for more sponsors as well, so feel free to reach out about the possibility of highlighting your brand at Render-Atlanta.
Has luck played a meaningful role in your life and business?
So, you may have heard the phrase “right time, right place”, which refers to the chance of being at the right time, and right place could result in your life-changing instantly. Personally though, I feel like it leaves out one critical piece which is “person” – “right time, right place, right person(s)”. I say this because we’re often in the right place, at the right time such as a networking event, but our time is being occupied by individuals who can’t assist us with our current endeavors. I’ve been fortunate in recent years to have all three align for me, which has been culminating in our rapid ability to scale Render-Atlanta. A major testament to this has been when I joined The Gathering Spot this past April and was quickly introduced to those in the Atlanta tech market. Being a member has drastically kept me in the right rooms, at the right time, with the right people that has helped me remove roadblocks that could have stopped our growth.
Pricing:
- 299 – Super Early Bird (Soldout)
- 399 – Early Bird (Soldout)
- 499 – Regular
- 650 – Late/Corporate
- 300 – Workshops (1 full day of workshops on May 4)
- All tickets include daily breakfast, lunch, and dinner, happy hours, and a conference T-Shirt. We’re also having a job fair on-site, which will only be open to conference attendees.
Contact Info:
- Website: RenderATL.com
- Email: Justin@RenderATL.com
- Instagram: @RenderATL , @ThugDebugger (personal)
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/renderatl
- Twitter: @RenderATL , @ThugDebugger (personal)
Image Credit:
William Hill Jr.
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