CRA Today
With nearly 50 years of experience, CRA is a women-owned, strategic communications firm serving clients across the country.
CRA is certified by the Women’s Business Enterprise Council (WBENC), the most relied-upon certification of women-owned businesses. Additionally, we are a Small Business Administration-certified Women-Owned Small Business and hold a General Services Administration (GSA) contract.
CEO Susan Lavenski began her career at CRA in 1998. Partners Alisha Maddox, Matt Fidler and Matt Isner have been at CRA for 20 years plus. The executive management team bought the company in 2015 and have expanded CRA’s footprint. We have become one of the nation’s leading digital communications firms, working for some of the largest, most recognizable brands.
Our experience has given us the rare ability to apply over five decades of traditional industry experience to the new world of communications - positioning our clients as a transparent, honest and reliable resource for the information the public seeks. Our expertise is in telling your story through compelling, thoughtful and consistent communication.
Our History
Better known as Charlie Ryan by those close to him, agency founder Charles Ryan was born a small-town West Virginia boy who went on to establish a communications firm legacy spanning four states. Ryan grew up in Keyser, WV, an industrial and railroad community that might seem an odd breeding ground for the kind of person who’d go on to thrive in public relations and advertising. But Ryan always found a way to connect with others, from his first job as a disc jockey for local radio to his initial career in journalism after attending West Virginia University.
He moved to Charleston and enjoyed an exceptional career in television news before deciding to make the leap to public relations and advertising by starting Charles Ryan Associates in 1974. While the leap was anything but guaranteed to succeed, within 10 years, Ryan was able to grow the company into the largest advertising and PR firm in West Virginia.