We’re primarily writers and editors, plus other fun and helpful things. Together, we have decades of experience in freelance writing, TV writing, marketing consulting, branding, and general human connection-ing. Some of us have been Vice Presidents at major media companies. Others, middle management at multi-million dollar corporations. One of us owned a farm and blogged about it brilliantly. Basically, we’re great at telling stories. Often times while waving our hands wildly.

Ben Baur is an actor/writer/director whose first foray into writing was a romantic comedy short film that let him live out his dream of being a gay, male Meg Ryan. He continues his journey to “America’s Gay Sweetheart” status writing queer content that has played at Outfest, NewFest, and many tests in between. His work for Group Hug started with covering The Magicians and 12 Monkeys for SYFY.com and now includes copywriting social media posts for Everything’s Gonna Be Okay and Motherland: Fort Salem (both airing on Freeform). Ben would like to take a second and suggest you go get yourself a nice, tall glass of water.

Claire Boyles loves coffee, kale, and ice cream. Author of the short story collection Site Fidelity with a novel (God willing) to come, Claire has written sales copy and social media for farms, realtors, and financial planners. Her essays and stories have appeared in the Virginia Quarterly Review, the Kenyon Review, and McSweeney’s Internet Tendency, among others, and she also writes movies for the Hallmark Channel. She would be happy to hold your fussy baby while you collect yourself and would love to discuss your garden and/or houseplants.

Zac Hug spent many years as a Digital Media Executive for Bravo, The View, and ABC Family. He was a writer on Drop Dead Diva (Lifetime) and Shadowhunters (Freeform). Zac wrote and produced the award-winning web series These People. Zac continues to churn out Hallmark Christmas movies including Road to Christmas, and Christmas in Evergreen: Letters to Santa. He teaches television writing at DePaul University, UCLA Extension and UBC. He has a BFA in Theatre from NYU, an MFA in Creative Writing from the University of British Columbia, and a dog named Pickles.

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Beth Johnson is a fan of all things pop culture. Current favorites include Love and Monsters, Evermore and Emily St. John Mandel. (OMG, The Glass Hotel!) Recent consulting projects involve digital project management, copywriting, and building and launching sites for small businesses. She also has worked on improving email campaigns, reworking copy flow and call to action text, writing entertainment news stories, tv series recaps and much more. Clients include NBC/Universal, Radish Media, RepairSmith, M3x Analytics and more. She is a graduate of The University of Chicago and has worked for The New Yorker, InStyle, Bravo, and ABC/Disney.

Erica Spates moved around a lot growing up and has experienced life in everything from small towns, to the suburbs of the South, to big cities like New York. She has eleven years of professional writing experience for television. Much of her background is in comedy and children's programming, which includes creating and showrunning THE HEALING POWERS OF DUDE for Netflix, as well as writing and producing on both Nickelodeon and Disney shows like VICTORIOUS and WALK THE PRANK. She has also developed a one hour YA Drama with HBOMax and several feature films. When Erica isn't teaching her 7-year-old daughter sarcastic comebacks, she loves to be a mentor to emerging writers of all backgrounds and ages. She's worked with WriteGirl, RespectAbility and #StartWith8. 

Drew Staten studied International Relations and Creative Writing at the University of Southern California. While he never joined the foreign service, he did teach English in Spain for a year and continues to write science fantasy novels and screenplays. For Group Hug, Drew has mainly focused on genre television content, covering shows like American Gods and The Chilling Adventures of Sabrina for SYFY.com. You can routinely find him displaying the patience of a saint as he explains the complex rules of board games or out visiting his number one crush, Trader Joe’s.

JJ Wienkers-Alvendia is a longtime TV/screenwriter, producer, agitator & activist, repping the G in LGBTQ+. He has written on hour-long dramas and adapted & sold an internationally best-selling novel to series. Happy to be part of Group Hug, JJ has penned thousands of quips for Freeform’s Brand pages, Holiday Stunts: 25 Days of Christmas and 31 Nights of Halloween, Series: Single Drunk Female and Motherland: Fort Salem — and counting! Brand storytelling, strategy and social copy are just a few of his specialities. Funny drama is his sweet spot in all narrative forms. He, too, is a proud dog daddy.