©Hailey Anne Photography
Strategist. Builder. Storyteller.
The short version: Megan A. Dutta builds brands, leads businesses, and blends strategy with creativity. She’s the CEO of Drain Guys Chicago, a former marketing and media leader in the AV and tech worlds, and a creative strategist who mixes structure with soul. After a 10-month full-time parenting pause, she now juggles leadership, consulting, art, and a little well-placed woo—with intention.
The full story: Megan A. Dutta is a business and creative strategist, award-winning marketer, and storyteller with over two decades of experience building brands, leading communications strategy, and guiding organizations through periods of growth and change.
She currently serves as CEO of Drain Guys Chicago, a family-owned plumbing, sewer, and drain-cleaning company serving the Chicagoland area. In that role, she leads brand strategy, operations, marketing, and growth initiatives—applying her background in storytelling and systems thinking to a service business rooted in trust, transparency, and community. She balances this role while actively parenting, consulting with select organizations, and continuing her creative work.
Dutta is also an experienced consultant, partnering with organizations to strengthen operations, reimagine brands, and develop growth blueprints designed for real people—not just metrics. Her approach blends strategy with substance and creativity with intention, prioritizing alignment, long-term growth, and human-centered leadership.
Earlier in her career, Dutta established herself as a respected editorial voice and industry leader within the audiovisual and technology sectors. She served as content director for Systems Contractor News (SCN) and Digital Signage Magazine (DSM), both Future plc publications, and was a content director and producer for major industry dailies including CES Daily, CEDIA Expo Daily, and InfoComm Show Daily. From 2017 to 2021, she organized and led the AV/IT Summit (formerly the SCN Think Tank), convening industry leaders to explore collaboration and future-forward innovation. During the COVID-19 pandemic, Dutta helped lead Future B2B’s rapid pivot to virtual programming, launching and leading successful initiatives including AV Network Nation and AV³.
Most recently, Dutta spent nearly four years at THE rAVe Agency as director of emerging markets, where she played a key role in the development and growth of LAVNCH and the now defunct LAVNCH [CODE]. Her work focused on emerging technologies such as XR, virtual production, and experiential media, translating innovation into actionable insight and helping position LAVNCH as a future-focused platform within the professional AV and technology communities.
In 2023, following a corporate layoff from THE rAVe Agency, Dutta made a deliberate and deeply personal decision to step away from full-time professional work for 10 months to focus on full-time parenting. That pause became a period of recalibration—one that reshaped how she thinks about leadership, authenticity, and what it means to build something that lasts.
Dutta’s professional foundation was built over more than a decade at Peerless-AV, where she held multiple marketing leadership roles, including marketing communications manager and tradeshow & events manager. There, she led corporate and product marketing initiatives, managed agency and vendor relationships, oversaw philanthropic efforts, and produced high-impact tradeshows and product launches that drove record lead generation.
Before entering the AV industry, she worked in the real estate industry as a marketing coordinator for The Appraisal Institute and later as a meeting planner for the National Brownfield Association.
Alongside her business work, Dutta is a practicing artist, writer, and Reiki practitioner. Creativity and energy are not side hobbies for her—they are integral to how she sees, thinks, and leads. This creative and intuitive practice informs how she listens, guides, and creates space for meaningful transformation, grounding her leadership in presence, care, and intention.
Dutta is a co-founder of Women of Digital Signage (WoDS) and Women in AV/IT (WAVIT) and has long been active in leadership roles across the AV/IT community, including chairing the InfoComm Exhibitor Steering Committee for the 2017 show. Her work and leadership have been recognized with honors such as Dealerscope’s 40 Under 40, AVIXA’s Young AV Professional Award, the Woman to Watch Award from Women in Consumer Technology, and multiple marketing industry accolades. She holds a B.A. in Integrated Marketing Communications and an Executive Certificate in Hospitality & Tourism Management from Roosevelt University and is a Certified Digital Content & Media Expert.
In her free time, she's creating, reflecting, and keeping up with a very curious toddler—favoring local adventures, fresh air, exploration, and the occasional Chicago Wolves hockey game.
The short version: Megan A. Dutta builds brands, leads businesses, and blends strategy with creativity. She’s the CEO of Drain Guys Chicago, a former marketing and media leader in the AV and tech worlds, and a creative strategist who mixes structure with soul. After a 10-month full-time parenting pause, she now juggles leadership, consulting, art, and a little well-placed woo—with intention.
The full story: Megan A. Dutta is a business and creative strategist, award-winning marketer, and storyteller with over two decades of experience building brands, leading communications strategy, and guiding organizations through periods of growth and change.
She currently serves as CEO of Drain Guys Chicago, a family-owned plumbing, sewer, and drain-cleaning company serving the Chicagoland area. In that role, she leads brand strategy, operations, marketing, and growth initiatives—applying her background in storytelling and systems thinking to a service business rooted in trust, transparency, and community. She balances this role while actively parenting, consulting with select organizations, and continuing her creative work.
Dutta is also an experienced consultant, partnering with organizations to strengthen operations, reimagine brands, and develop growth blueprints designed for real people—not just metrics. Her approach blends strategy with substance and creativity with intention, prioritizing alignment, long-term growth, and human-centered leadership.
Earlier in her career, Dutta established herself as a respected editorial voice and industry leader within the audiovisual and technology sectors. She served as content director for Systems Contractor News (SCN) and Digital Signage Magazine (DSM), both Future plc publications, and was a content director and producer for major industry dailies including CES Daily, CEDIA Expo Daily, and InfoComm Show Daily. From 2017 to 2021, she organized and led the AV/IT Summit (formerly the SCN Think Tank), convening industry leaders to explore collaboration and future-forward innovation. During the COVID-19 pandemic, Dutta helped lead Future B2B’s rapid pivot to virtual programming, launching and leading successful initiatives including AV Network Nation and AV³.
Most recently, Dutta spent nearly four years at THE rAVe Agency as director of emerging markets, where she played a key role in the development and growth of LAVNCH and the now defunct LAVNCH [CODE]. Her work focused on emerging technologies such as XR, virtual production, and experiential media, translating innovation into actionable insight and helping position LAVNCH as a future-focused platform within the professional AV and technology communities.
In 2023, following a corporate layoff from THE rAVe Agency, Dutta made a deliberate and deeply personal decision to step away from full-time professional work for 10 months to focus on full-time parenting. That pause became a period of recalibration—one that reshaped how she thinks about leadership, authenticity, and what it means to build something that lasts.
Dutta’s professional foundation was built over more than a decade at Peerless-AV, where she held multiple marketing leadership roles, including marketing communications manager and tradeshow & events manager. There, she led corporate and product marketing initiatives, managed agency and vendor relationships, oversaw philanthropic efforts, and produced high-impact tradeshows and product launches that drove record lead generation.
Before entering the AV industry, she worked in the real estate industry as a marketing coordinator for The Appraisal Institute and later as a meeting planner for the National Brownfield Association.
Alongside her business work, Dutta is a practicing artist, writer, and Reiki practitioner. Creativity and energy are not side hobbies for her—they are integral to how she sees, thinks, and leads. This creative and intuitive practice informs how she listens, guides, and creates space for meaningful transformation, grounding her leadership in presence, care, and intention.
Dutta is a co-founder of Women of Digital Signage (WoDS) and Women in AV/IT (WAVIT) and has long been active in leadership roles across the AV/IT community, including chairing the InfoComm Exhibitor Steering Committee for the 2017 show. Her work and leadership have been recognized with honors such as Dealerscope’s 40 Under 40, AVIXA’s Young AV Professional Award, the Woman to Watch Award from Women in Consumer Technology, and multiple marketing industry accolades. She holds a B.A. in Integrated Marketing Communications and an Executive Certificate in Hospitality & Tourism Management from Roosevelt University and is a Certified Digital Content & Media Expert.
In her free time, she's creating, reflecting, and keeping up with a very curious toddler—favoring local adventures, fresh air, exploration, and the occasional Chicago Wolves hockey game.