Before her roles at LivingSocial, Galley Foods, Sweetgreen, and South Block, Alexandra Lawrence grew up singing. She taught herself to play every instrument she could get her hands on, including the guitar and piano. She wrote songs from scratch and sang the national anthem at school events. Her passion for the performing arts is still a large part of her identity today.

“Professionally, we don’t always talk about our passions, but they influence who I am and the decisions I make,” Lawrence says. “In performing arts, you need to learn how to connect with your audience and deliver the right message at the right time to the right person. That’s how I approach audiences and segmentation today as a marketer.”

While Lawrence has spent over 13 years in marketing and client relations, her career didn’t start that way. In college, she gravitated toward numbers and finance—a decision she viewed as safe, which added to her expertise in making data-driven decisions for organizations.

Right out of college, she worked at LivingSocial in the customer experience department, taking up to 150 phone calls daily. She used this exposure to develop a muscle for empathy, maximize her resources as a one-person marketing team at Galley Foods, and build deep, personal connections with her customers—a proficiency she would carry with her to other roles.

As a product marketer for Sweetgreen’s growth channels for over four years during the brand’s iconic upswing, Lawrence moved out of the weeds of day-to-day execution and gained insight into high-level strategy. She developed marketing campaigns from scratch and learned which levers to pull to make the biggest impact on the organization.

She oversaw the implementation of Sweetgreen’s first drive-thru restaurant, the Sweetlane, from start to finish. This marked a first for the brand, opening up convenience for suburban markets and introducing a shift toward automated kitchen formats. She led in-store loyalty acquisition and directed the marketing strategies behind this brand transformation, fueled by her creative and analytical prowess.

Lawrence was recently announced as the new director of marketing for South Block, a 17-unit concept in the DMV area specializing in made-to-order smoothies, açaí bowls, toasts, and cold-pressed juices. Drawing on her background at Sweetgreen, she’s ready to hit the ground running.

“I was lucky to have worked on such a huge project for Sweetgreen, and one of the big things I’m going to bring to South Block is the ability to zoom out and introduce high-level strategic thinking to whatever we’re going to be doing next,” Lawrence says. “As we add new formats to our portfolio, I’m going to bring a deeper understanding of how we can integrate them into the rest of our fleetwide marketing plans.”

During her first 90 days, Lawrence focused on understanding South Block’s dynamics and identifying potential gaps in the marketing foundation. She updated personalization and segmentation strategies with new data to understand how the brand can thoughtfully show up in new markets, such as Dulles Airport.

“Anytime you open a new distribution channel for customers, it’s very exciting, but we’re going to be getting thousands of eyeballs on us a week from both domestic and international guests. It’s like a billboard,” Lawrence adds. “It’s going to unlock newfound brand awareness for us as a regional brand, but we want to be able to bring the South Block experience to the airport and set up our teams for success through these foundational projects to streamline operations.”

In January, South Block entered into a growth partnership with the well-known private equity firm Savory Fund, which invests in emerging restaurant concepts. As a DMV native, Lawrence is excited to watch the brand grow nationally, but she’s fortifying South Block’s marketing systems to withstand the jump in unit count coming down the pipeline.

“I want to make sure [my team] is growing in line with the business needs, as it will surely change from 17 to 50 stores,” Lawrence says. “Right now, I’m future-proofing some of our projects and our approach. We’re very much in startup mode, but as the business matures, we’re going to start seeing more specialized roles and systems in place.”

South Block is deeply ingrained in the DMV area, with locally-owned restaurants and community programs that give back to local businesses and schools. The brand got its name from its initial 700-square-foot location in Clarendon, Virginia, known as the “South Block” side of town. Lawrence acknowledges how important heritage is to the brand, even as it starts to expand into new territories.

“We’re always going to push the envelope on innovation and growth, but we’re making a point to listen to our customers and show up authentically wherever we go,” Lawrence says. “I love connecting with people, and this is a people-first organization. Creating a strong marketing foundation energizes me, and we’re feeling good about our future and setting the bar high for success.”