About DadLabs

America is seeing a fundamental shift in the role of men in parenting. While many in the media and academia have observed this trend, no company has emerged to meet the needs of these "New" fathers, the modern dads. Enter DadLabs, Inc., a start-up company dedicated to providing creative media content and information products to serve this new generation of "Super Dads."

Headquartered in Austin, Texas, DadLabs is an information and entertainment company that fosters the father/child relationship through media, instructional and retail products.

The mission of the company is to strengthen families and benefit children by empowering today's fathers.

The company provides resources to expecting, new and veteran fathers that will launch them into a more active and creative role in the lives of their children. DadLabs speaks to the corporate executive and the delivery driver with a voice that is authentic and genuinely male, with wisdom and self-deprecating humor of experience. The products and services offered are honest, informative, sometimes off-color, but always dedicated to the spirit of fatherhood. DadLabs speaks guy and presents information through guy-colored lenses.

Founded in 2004 by Troy Lanier, Clay Nichols and Brad Powell, DadLabs aims to be the voice of the new fatherhood. The company was founded on the core value that parents must be the primary movers in the lives of their children and fathers must play a leading role in this journey. The team at DadLabs is committed to assisting the busy father by providing him with accessible and digestible information and parenting ideas. DadLabs will not only inform and entertain fathers, but will also foster creative father/child activities through retail products.

The trio brings more than 30 years of teaching and hands on fatherhood experience, as well as professional filmmaking and writing experience. Troy Lanier and Clay Nichols are accomplished authors and were named to the Austin Chronicle Best of 2005 for their book "Filmmaking for Teens: Pulling off Your Shorts." The company's first DVD, DueDads: The Man's Survival Guide to Pregnancy won a 27th annual Bronze Telly Award. The company released “DadLabs: A Guide to Fatherhood: Pregnancy and Year One”, the first of a series of books published by Quirk Books released on Father's Day 2009. DadLabs is also in the process of developing a TV show based on the company.

All three founders have been long time teachers at Austin's St. Stephen's School and combined have seven small children.

Brad Powell - Chief Operating Officer, Producer, Co-Founder, and Star

Twitter @daddybrad

Brad Powell a.k.a. “Daddy Brad” earned a B.A. in economics from the University of the South in Sewanee Tennessee and an M.B.A from St. Edward’s University in Austin Texas. He is currently the Chief Operating Officer of DadLabs Inc. and is in charge of all business operations of the company. Daddy Brad serves as co-host for two of the DadLabs weekly web shows and is an avid daddy blogger, accomplished parenting speaker and social media panelist.

Powell is co-author of DadLabs Guide To Fatherhood, Pregnancy and Year One, “ Quirk Books 2009” and co-author of The Effects of Developmental Mentoring on Connectedness and Academic Achievement published in The School Community Journal Fall 2002. Powell is a regular columnist for the web publication Destination Maternity.com and was selected as Dad of the Month by I-Parenting Media in May of 2008. He is an avid Tweeter and was recently named to Austin Social Media’s Top 100 list.

Brad is one heck of a harmonica player, and a regular in music venues and recording studios in Austin, Texas, the Live Music Capitol of the World, where he makes his home with his wife and two wonderful children (#3 is on the way)!

Clay Nichols - Chief Creative Officer, Co-Founder, Writer, Producer, and Star

Twitter @daddyclay

Clay Nichols is a husband, father, author, playwright, teacher, and now screenwriter and television host. He has written over a dozen plays for both young and adult audiences that have been produced across the country, most recently in Los Angeles, Chicago, Denver and Louisville, Kentucky. Titles include Appleseed John, The Speaker Speaks and The Nose in Exile. His plays have received awards from the Center for American History at the University of Texas, the Austin Critics' Table, The Playwrights' Center of San Francisco, and Stages Theatre of Houston, among others. His book “Pulling Off Your Shorts: Filmmaking for Teens” co-authored with Troy Lanier, published in April 2005 by Michael Wiese Productions, has been widely praised by critics and kids alike. A second and revised edition will be released in 2010.

Nichols is a veteran of a dozen years in the high school classroom, having taught in the areas of English, Creative Writing, Drama and Filmmaking. As a consequence he has read The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn way too many times.

Nichols is a graduate of Dartmouth College and holds an MFA in playwriting from the University of Texas where he was a James A. Michener Fellow at the Texas Center for Writers. He is founder and director of the Theatre Focus program at St. Stephen's School and the Texas Arts Project. He lives in Austin, Texas with his wife and three children ages eleven, eight and five.

Troy Lanier: Chief Technical Officer, Co-Founder, Producer, Director, Editor, and On Screen Talent

Twitter @troylanier

Troy supervises all production, post production, encoding, and uploading for DadLabs.com.   Other responsibilities include video analytics, website, distribution, on-screen talent, and business development.

His first production, Star Wars and Monkey Bars, was cast on the fourth grade playground.  Since then he has worked for NASA, produced documentaries on diverse topics such as New Urbanism, Immigiration and Folk Art in Mexico.  Comfortable on rope and in high places, Lanier also travels with climbing and caving expeditions.

Troy is the co-author of Filmmaking for Teens, now in its second edition.

Lanier holds a degree in Electrical Engineering from the Georgia Institute of Technology and a Masters in the History of Science and Technology from the University of Wisconsin. He lives in Austin, Texas with his wife and two children.

Owen Egerton - Writer and Star

Creator of the popular DadLabs show "Daditude." Owen Egerton is also the author of a collection of short stories How to Best Avoid Dying, the novel Marshall Hollenzer is Driving, several screenplays (including the award winning Evil Twinkie) and a number of essays. His writing has been featured in Puerto del Sol, Killing the Buddha, Tiferet, Word Riot, and several other magazines and literary journals.

Owen earned a MFA in Creative Writing from Texas State University in 2005. He is also the co-creator of the hit comedy troupe The Sinus Show that performed for six years at the Alamo Drafthouse and for several years was the artistic director of Austin’s National Comedy Theatre. He is a contributing commentator for public radio, an accomplished recording artist and founder of the equal marriage rights group The Right to Marry. Owen lives in Austin, Texas with his hot wife Jodi and brilliant kids Arden and Oscar .

John Fowler - Director of Marketing

Twitter @techfowler

John has lived in Denver, Oklahoma, Houston, London and Lubbock, but decided Austin was his true home after a barefoot summer day spent at Barton Springs, eating trailer-park tacos and playing his guitar. John feels that attending live music is the essence to maintaining a healthy lifestyle. He often carries a guitar, not because he’s a gifted musician, but because he thinks it makes him look cool.

John obtained a Bachelor in Business Administration in Marketing from Texas Tech University. While studying at Texas Tech, John developed a strong interest in the shift from traditional marketing to grassroots and social marketing through the use of digital media. John’s passion for digital marketing led him to St. Edward’s University where he obtained a Masters in Business Administration in Digital Media Management in 2008.

During his tenure at St. Edward’s, John served as one of the founding fathers and Marketing Director for one of the first student operated online TV stations, SEUiTV. In addition, John has served as a digital marketing consultant for projects with companies such as MindBites and C3 Presents. He joined the DadLabs team in November of 2008. John spends his time at DadLabs working on anything from graphic design to search engine optimization.

Aaron Segura - Camera Operator/Editor/Gaffer/Co-Director/Grip

Twitter @aaronsegura

Aaron Segura is sixty-seven inches tall. He joined the Army Reserves in 2002 and was sent to Iraq from 2004 to 2005. Aaron finished his education at the University of Texas at Austin where he received a Bachelors of Science in Radio-TV-Film.

He first joined the Dadlabs team in the summer of 2006 where he was a camera operator for “Man’s Survival Guide to Labor Delivery.” Aaron served as an intern for Dadlabs in the fall of 2008 where he performed various tasks such as, camera operator and editor. He has not written any books or accomplished any significant reputable goals, but he can do ninety pushups in two minutes. He is also, one of the words fastest editors for online video and he has a great smile.

Dixie Davis - Camera Operator/Editor/Audio Technician

Twitter @dixiediy

Born into a family of blue grass troubadours in West Germany, Dixie Davis returned to her home state of Texas at the age of two to begin her formal training as a scuba diver in Corpus Christi.

She relocated to Austin, TX in 2005 to peruse a degree in astrophysics but quickly switched to film, because science isn't really important, anyway.

Since then she ventured to the Pacific Northwest to hunt geoducks and fish for king crab, lived in Prague while studying post communist modern art, led a snorkeling group in the Galapagos, recovered missing US aircrafts in the jungles of Laos and Vietnam and traveled through Europe sampling every known flavor of gelato. She may or may not have infiltrated the Russian counter intelligence agency but that information is classified.

In 2008 she moved to Los Angeles because she liked the movie Swingers but after being inundated by hundreds of self serve frozen yogurt bars and disillusioned by smog she headed back east to Austin on a tandem bike with her Venezuelan boyfriend, Enrique, narrowly escaping violent Mexican drug lords.

These days she leads a more tranquil life shooting and editing videos for DadLabs.com, taking swing dance lessons, knitting, rescuing feral cats, practicing yoga and mastering the art of apartment balcony herb gardening. She currently has no children but will gladly except donations.

Alec Summers - Composer and Music Producer

Alec is a composer that has written music in many genres and for many mediums of broadcast media and live performance. He has studied composition and jazz piano performance at Northwestern University, University of Miami, University of Maryland, and the University of Pittsburgh. Alec has also performed extensively as a pianist and keyboardist in several regional rock and funk bands, as well as gigging regularly as a jazz pianist. He is "daddy" to his lovely daughter, Catie, and frequently views the DadLabs site for parenting tips, advice, and some laughs. Please visit www.alecsummers.com for more info and examples of his compositional work.

DadLabs also uses music from  Kevin McLeod, which can be found at www.incompetech.com