We are pleased that you have visited our site and we are excited to help you develop meaningful and profitable connections!

Our History

City of Experts was founded by St. Louis businesswoman Karen Hoffman after she considered the frustration and time she spent on finding experts and consultants for keynote speakers, business advisers, and panel discussions. As a busy executive, she spent countless hours directly and indirectly networking to find a specific speaker or business consultant locally and nationally. She thought, “wouldn’t it be great if a resource was developed to showcase experts by region and expertise?”

“If other executives, event planners, and small businesses considered the time they spend finding the right consultant or expert, they would certainly see the value of having access to a pool of local experts,” said Hoffman. The idea has been validated and supported by program chairs, meeting planners, expert speakers and consultants.

Our Mission

City of Experts helps make strategic business connections.
City of Experts is THE marketing arm for local expert speakers, consultants, authors and coaches. The City of Experts Team is dedicated to promoting our Experts through our co-op marketing, tthrough our website, word of mouth marketing, business articles, direct mail programs, e-mail marketing, networking events, workshops, media publications, advertising, expos, and more.

For less than 60 cents a day, our experts are being promoted in ways that would normally cost them hundreds of dollars a month because we can leverage our resources.

City of Experts also provides a critical resource to FIND those LOCAL Experts. Our Searchers save countless hours, resources and money and searching is always FREE.

Our Management Team

Karen Hoffman Karen Hoffman – THE CONNECTOR and CATALYST FOR CREATING COMMUNITIES OF COLLABORATION Karen’s passion is making “strategic” business connections and creating communities of collaboration that help people develop, grow, and achieve extraordinary results. She acts as a catalyst with her authentic and strategic introductions. Karen is also known as the Idea Coach and facilitates a variety of workshops, seminars, and entrepreneur groups focused on collaboration and positivity. Karen’s unique gift for connecting people, uncovering talent, and initiating partnerships has developed a loyal following. [Read More]

Lethia Owens Lethia Owens – The Chief Branding Officer Lethia Owens is the CEO of Lethia Owens International, Inc., a Personal Branding & Social Media Consulting Firm. She passionately coaches business owners through the process of creating their IRRESISTIBLE brand so they attract massive leads, more ideal clients and endless referrals.Lethia’s career has enabled her to direct the brand development, marketing, business development, leadership branding and (or) communications strategy for industry leading organizations such as The Boeing Company, State Farm, Energizer, Monsanto, Unigroup, IRS, Macrovision and Coca Cola. She is committed to elevating and directing the branding efforts of COE and its members. [Read More]

Our Vendor Partners

CallKayla.com One of the most powerful things you can do to step into your full potential as a start-up or growing business, is to put systems in place that enhance your productivity and put the right people in place to help you accomplish your business goals. CallKayla is a New Media and Technology firm that specializes in helping businesses powerfully promote their brand online. CallKayla is the proud developer of the COE website. You may reach their office at 636.244.5041 or visit their website at www.CallKayla.com.

Russo’s Catering Spazio’s in Westport – City of Experts has used Spazio’s for almost all of their networking events because of the service that Mark Russo wants Spazio’s to provide to their clients. Karen in particular loves to meet at Spazio’s to support Mark and introduce people to the Spazio’s. Sometimes she is asked by those that work there if in fact she lives there because she makes a point of meeting there so often. Since 2009, many City of Experts events have been held in Russo venues. Contact Spazio’s at 314-576-0488 or visit their website at www.russosgourmet.com

Our Co-Founders Angela A. Lieb and Ken Schriever

Just as Rome wasn’t built in a day, neither was the COE community. Angela A. Lieb and Ken Schriever are co-founders who have contributed their time, treasure and talent to help build St. Louis’ premier expert search directory. [Read More about our Co-Founders]