Goodbye L.A.S., Hello Upload.

I’m writing this the evening before we’re planning to announce that we’ve officially changed our company name from L.A.S. Media Group to Upload Media Group. It’s a move that is full of emotion for all of us, but one that we’re ultimately excited and thrilled to be making.

The number one question we get when we let people know we’re changing the name is…why?

It’s for a few reasons: When we started L.A.S., we thought it was going to be a real estate marketing company. I was just launching my career in real estate and I had a vision for creating a company that would revolutionize how mid-sized communities interacted with the real estate market through content. That’s why we named the company L.A.S. - it was simply my initials.

Eventually, as we pivoted our company to fill the need we saw in community content, L.A.S. became less and less useful as a name. We tried keeping the name and replacing the meaning with our values, but in the long run, it just didn’t make sense for it to be my initials any more. What the company became actually had very little to do with me as a person - I’m not actually even behind the microphone on any shows anymore - but it became more about creating a space and platform for the community to create and connect through content.

Plus, everyone was misspelling L.A.S. all the time. Every time I went into the bank and they called us “las media group”, I knew we were missing the mark with our name.

So - time for a change.

The honest truth is that we learned SO MUCH as L.A.S., but it also feels nice to start fresh with everything we learned and move forward with a clearer vision of our mission and who we are, now with a name and brand that supports it and isn’t a remnant of a past vision.

So where did Upload come from?

Here’s an insider look at a bootstrapped startup: In around October of 2022, it was really clear that we were missing the mark with some of our operations. Operationally, we had grown organically, but we also grew so quickly that we skipped over a lot of the things that we would consider “foundational pieces” to a business’ regular operations. We decided that we weren’t going to be as successful as we wanted to be without going back and getting those things in place.

We also had a major contributor to our organization step away (whom we absolutely, 100% still love, of course), but it caused a major shift in how we would operate for a while.

So, in November of 2022, we started the process of reviewing our operations and “self-auditing” our entire company. It was an extremely challenging but immensely rewarding experience.

As we were self-auditing, we took it all the way to the beginning - the name.

After months of throwing around ideas and designs and research, we decided on Upload Media Group.

We feel that Upload Media is an easy name to get behind - it’s both digital and tech forward, but also leaves room for warmth and interpretation. We aim to be a company that offers a premium, professional experience to every community - not just the big ones - and Upload Media feels like an iconic representation of elevated digital excellence. With the design, we strove to keep the bright and vibrant colors of the L.A.S. paint design (which originated from our real estate days as well) with a clean icon that could visually represent the brand without any words.

Maybe we’ll get Craig (Co-Founder and Designer of the Visual Brand) to pop on for a blog update about the design, but for now, know that Upload is the clean, professional, yet colorful brand that represents who we are today and where we hope to go.

So now we’re Upload Media. What’s next?

We have HUGE ambitions for the future, but our hope is to re-establish our standard operations over the coming months.

You may have noticed our network shows slowed down releases over the winter season. This was primarily to grant us the space to audit the company and better our operations. We hope to bring back some of those shows in a bigger, better, and more consistent way while also introducing some new projects.

Along with the launch of Upload Media as a brand, we are also ready to introduce our new studio in the Czech Village to the world. Starting now, Upload Studio Rentals are open to the public. Now, anyone in the community can rent our studio space, our equipment, and access our services at an affordable rate to bring their idea to life. We’re starting by opening “Studio B” - our new dedicated podcasting and audio studio - for rent, but we’ll soon open “Studio A” - our video room featuring lights, cameras, and multiple sets - for rent as well.

We’re still doing Production-for-Hire work as well, now under the name Upload Media Productions. We’re creating podcasts, livestreams, videos, and more for clients throughout the corridor.

And we’ll soon be moving forward with a number of other exciting projects that are in the works, including some fun community live projects and the beginnings of our educational programming.

So now I guess I’ll say -

Goodbye, L.A.S. You meant so much to so many of us. You created true magic regardless of whether you were in a closet under some stairs, a spare room in an old theatre, or in an exciting studio space in the heart of the community. You produced true, inspiring works of art and more than a few pieces of audio junk that we’d rather forget about. You created friendships that will last a lifetime.

Hell, I documented my entire journey of becoming a biological father through L.A.S.

But now we lay you to rest and bring for Upload Media Group as an offering to the world.

We hope you like it!

Upload Complete.