By Mark Waller, NOLA.com | The Times-Picayune 
Follow on Twitter
on July 18, 2013 at 11:54 AM, updated July 18, 2013 at 4:23 PM

A 3-year-old, growing New Orleans company that connects market researchers with pools of survey takers on the Internet announced it has recruited an executive working for an international market research firm in Los Angeles and is moving another executive from Los Angeles to New Orleans. In making the moves, the company, Federated Sample, is touting New Orleans as an increasingly appealing destination for people in technology.

Federated Sample named Michael McCrary as president in 2011. He was based in Los Angeles and now is relocating to New Orleans. A company statement said McCrary has worked in marketing, advertising and research for more than 15 years, most recently as managing director for the Cint AB firm, which is based in Sweden, has offices worldwide and in 2010 licensed Federated Sample’s technology, called Fulcrum. Before that, McCrary worked for the data collection firm Greenfield Online, where he was a senior vice president in charge of North American sales when Microsoft acquired the firm.

Federated Sample also named Brett Schnittlich, a 10-year veteran of the online market research field and recent chief technology officer for Lieberman Research Worldwide, based in Los Angeles, as chief technology officer and executive vice president, along with adding him to its board of directors.

“Federated Sample is fundamentally changing an industry I’ve been a part of for over a decade,” Schnittlich said in a statement from the company. “I am thrilled to join this cutting edge team and to be a part of the re-imagining of online market research.”

Through the Fulcrum platform, the company serves as a marketplace for brands seeking willing survey participants. It links them with firms that maintain contacts for pools of survey respondents.

When it was founded in June 2010, Federated Sample had five employees. By June 2013, the company reported growing to 45. It processed 213,501 surveys in its partial year in 2010, more than 2 million in its first full year of 2011 more than 5 million in the most recent full year of 2012 and says 2013 is on track for another increase. In total, it has served as a catalyst for more than 11.5 million survey transactions.

The founder, Patrick Comer, developed the company through the city’s entrepreneurship support system, participating in programs from The Idea Village start-up network and working from the Launch Pad business incubator before moving into office space in the Canal Place office tower.

“Over the past several years, New Orleans has grown into a true hub for technology and entrepreneurship,” said an announcement from Federated Sample. “Relocating senior tech executives to NOLA demonstrates the growing start-up scene and the opportunities it represents.”

The announcement quotes Comer as saying, “We’ve come a long way and executive brain gain will only strengthen New Orleans.”