Ed Bergstraesser is an independent consultant and communications strategist and writer with more than 25 years of experience in public relations, advocacy, corporate social responsibility, issues management, and community relations in a variety of industries, including the burgeoning cannabis industry.  

 

Prior to establishing a Bergstraesser Strategies consultancy in 2019, Ed was external affairs director at AT&T for a dozen years, handling public relations and public affairs for the company, including media and analyst relations, corporate social responsibility, crisis communications, and investor relations.  

 

Ed is a charter member of the Hudson Valley Cannabis Industry Association and has represented the industry at a regional New York Chronogram Conversations symposium. He also attends countless seminars and trade shows in the industry. In addition to a degree from Carleton College in Minnesota, he has done graduate work in fiction writing at the University of California Santa Crus and attained a certificate in the business of cannabis in 2021.

 

For many years prior to establishing Bergstraesser Strategies, Ed worked with public relations agencies, not-for-profit organizations, and Fortune 500 companies, including United Airlines and MCI.  He has substantial experience in mergers and acquisitions communications.  In addition, he has directed national and grassroots public awareness programs, most notably an award-winning online voter registration drive, bringing together public and private entities to register 75,000 citizens in the nascent stages of internet commerce and advocacy - and garnering 300 million impressions along the way, as well as a Smithsonian Award.  

 

Ed maintains executive board membership in Parks and Trails of New York, the Bardavon (a New York performing arts theatre), and Ulster Performing Arts Center and is affiliated with multiple non-profit organizations. A winner of seven industry awards, he is also actively involved in a host of other corporate communications and public affairs associations. 

 

His first job was with The Chicago Reporter, an award-winning, investigative monthly on urban affairs and race relations.

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