Lauren Adkins began working for the National Trust National Main Street Center in 1991. Her work at the Center currently focuses on brand management, partnership development and managing the Center's consulting services division, including marketing, staff supervision, budgeting and client relations. Ms. Adkins is a regular conference speaker and continues to provide consulting and training services. She has worked with hundreds of communities in 38 states, plus the District of Columbia, Canada and Singapore. Ms. Adkins has served as a faculty member at various Main Street conferences and workshops, speaking on topics such as retail promotion, volunteer management, fundraising, market analysis and strategic planning. She has authored several articles for Main Street News and served as a guest lecturer for Catholic University, University of Tokyo and George Washington University.

Before joining the National Trust for Historic Preservation, she served as a Main Street manager in Benton, AR, and as the executive director for a neighborhood commercial district revitalization project in Arlington, VA. Ms. Adkins holds a BA in Art and Archaeology from Washington University in St. Louis, MO, and attended the Columbia University Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation in New York. She is a native of Hot Springs, AR. Ms. Adkins is the granddaughter and daughter of "Main Street" merchants who owned the Adkins Public Drug from 1934 to 1984, and her great, great, great, great, great grandparents opened the first general store in White County, AR, in the mid-nineteenth century.